The COVID-19 pandemic in Saudi Arabia is part of the worldwide pandemic of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2). On 2 March 2020, the Ministry of Health confirmed the first case in Saudi Arabia. By 8 April, as many as 150 members of the Saudi royal family had tested positive. The king's nephew, Faisal bin Bandar Al Saud, has been put in the intensive care unit at an elite hospital over coronavirus complications. As of 25 June, the kingdom has 170,639 confirmed cases, the highest among the Arabian Gulf States, with 117,882 recoveries and 1,428 deaths. On 12 January 2020, the World Health Organization (WHO) confirmed that a novel coronavirus was the cause of a respiratory illness in a group of people in the city of Wuhan, Hubei in China which was reported to the WHO on 31 December 2019. The case fatality ratio for COVID-19 has been much lower than SARS of 2003, but the transmission has been significantly greater, with a significant total death toll.