Seoul, Jun 4 (IANS): Five more cases of Middle East Respiratory Syndrome (MERS) have been detected in South Korea, raising the total to 35, authorities said on Thursday.

This includes two health care workers who treated infected patients, Xinhua news agency reported.

Also, one of the new confirmed cases was a person who had shared a hospital room with an infected patient and two others were infected after visiting a ward where the country's first confirmed patient was admitted, the health ministry said.

Two people have already died of the viral disease.

A chief master sergeant in the Osan Air Base was confirmed positive for the MERS at the first test. The final result is yet to come.

About 100 soldiers at the air base, where the South Korean and US troops are stationed together, have been isolated.

MERS is considered a deadly but less transmissible cousin of the Severe Actue Respiratory Syndrome (SARS) virus, which erupted in Asia in 2003 and infected thousands of people.