News Brief on 09 Apr
Canada
Toronto - Sars has infected one of the top doctors battling its spread in Canada, Dr Allison McGeer.
It also killed a 10th person and another death is being investigated as possibly having been caused by Sars.
Hong Kong
Hong Kong - Cockcroaches may be blamed for the large number of Sars victims at Amoy Gardens, a crowded apartment complex where nearly 300 of the total 928 cases have been reported.
Deputy health director Leung Pak Yin said cockcroaches could have carried the virus into homes after picking it up from waste in sewage pipes.
Thailand
Bangkok - Thai Prie Minister Thaksin Shinawatra yesterday offered one million baht (S$41,000) to the family of any Thai who dies after contracting Sars in the country.
In a broadcast on TV and radio, he said he was confident his government had contained its spread and would not have to pay up.
Japan
Tokyo - The Health Ministry has found four new suspected cases of Sars, a day after it cleared 28 people of having the disease.
20 Apr
China sharply raises SARS number, reveals 339 new cases in Beijing
China, under fire at home and abroad for failing to disclose the extent of its SARS infections, has sharply raised its number of cases to 1,807 from 1,512 and revealed 339 new infections in Beijing.
The nationwide death toll from Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome in China now stands at 79, the health ministry said in a statement.
Beijing had another 402 suspected cases as of April 18 and 18 people had died of the disease in the capital, the statement said.
Up until Sunday, officials had reported only 37 infections in Beijing, despite estimates from Chinese doctors and World Health Organisation experts of a far higher toll.
The statement gave three explanations as to why the extent of the outbreak had not been reported before.
It said SARS was a new disease and it had been difficult to come up with a diagnosis, and that Beijing had a lot of hospitals and patients were scattered across the city.
But it also said the health ministry did not prepare well enough.
The statement showed 1,304 cases in Guangdong, 108 in Shanxi, 25 in Inner Mongolia, 12 in Guangxi, six in Hunan, five in Sichuan, three in Fujian, two in Shanghai, two in Henan and one in Ningxia.
China's leaders have ordered governments at all levels in the country to come clean on the SARS outbreak.
Earlier state media reported that three cases of SARS were detected in China's eastern Zhejiang province, where no cases had been reported previously.
The cases were discovered in the provincial capital Hangzhou, the China News Service reported.
Meanwhile China's education ministry has urged university students to refrain from travelling home during the upcoming week-long Labour Day holiday, in a bid to stop the spread of SARS.
The call for students to confine themselves on campus comes just 10 days the holiday.
And beginning Monday, all Chinese domestic air passengers will have to sign a declaration stating they do not suffer from various SARS symptoms before being allowed to board their aircraft.
Passengers will be asked to tick boxes asking them if they have had fever, coughing or respiratory problems over the previous two weeks, state media reported.
Ground personnel are also to report immediately to the nearest health facility if they observe passengers with possible SARS symptoms.
There is a dangerous virus spreading through Hong Kong.
It is NOT atypical pneumonia. It is panic.
All outbreaks of any high-profile pathogen or disease (c.f. the UK's Mad Cow disease) have two major effects. A tiny proportion of people are hit by the disease itself. A large number of people, organizations and entire industry sectors are hit by the panic that accompanies it.
Yes, you should be careful and take all precautions as advised by your medical advisor, but no, you don't have to panic and flee Hong Kong.
1. You don't have to stay at home. At the time of writing (first week of April, 2003), more than 99.999% of people in Hong Kong are completely free of the SARS virus.
2. An increase in numbers doesn't mean people in every apartment block have it. The virus's growth pattern shows a tendency to remain tightly clustered - for example in the Prince of Wales Hospital and Amoy Gardens.
3. Ninety-nine people a day die of flu every day in the United States alone. Of these 99, about 30 die of acute respiratory problems. In Hong Kong, 16 people have died over a month.
4. In any large city of this size, there are hundreds of pneumonia sufferers at any time, of which several dozen have some form of atypical pneumonia.
5. Yes, the virus does mutate. But this doesn't necessarily mean it continually gets more virulent. Scientists note that as SARS spreads, it is significantly weakening from carrier to carrier.
6. The media may call it a killer virus, but the survival rate among those hit in these clusters is 96%.
7. Yes, we all care about our children, but very few kids get it - careful examination of lists confirms that victims tend to be elderly people with a direct physical link to the clusters.
8. Contaminated places get clean by themselves. The virus dies without a carrier. Some scientists estimate its life as three hours, others say a little longer, but all agree it cannot hibernate. In other words, you can even check into the Metropole Hotel floor 9 without fear.
9. The virus is believed to die when the air temperature reaches 27 degrees C. One hot Hong Kong day could fry all traces of it on exposed surfaces.
10. You can keep your air conditioner on in the office. Ward 8B in the Prince of Wales Hospital shares an air conditioning system with the infected Ward 8A. But there was not a single infection in 8B.
11. Many people assume the "growth model" of the virus will follow sci-fi movie scenarios. Evidence suggests it is more likely to follow the Guangzhou experience, where it spread for a few weeks and then started to contract.
12. The flood of panicky emails from a variety of people, including doctors who should know better, is not helpful. One email doing the rounds is instructing people not to exercise, for example. Panic creates muddleheadedness. Consider the facts above. Hong Kong is our home.
Stay calm and stay healthy!
Choice Communication International Limited
04 May
China takes tough measures against SARS as more deaths are reported
China is making it clear that it is taking no chances with the SARS virus as the government announces fresh steps to battle the virus.
Chinese health officials have been fired nationwide for not doing enough to contain the disease.
Even in southern Hainan province, which has not yet reported a single case of SARS, several officials were sacked for failing to implement SARS prevention measures.
With 7 more people dead and 163 new cases, tough measures continue to be implemented, particularly in Beijing which is bearing the brunt of the epidemic.
Schools in Beijing, already suspended for 2 weeks, have been ordered to stay closed for two more weeks.
The Chinese government is placing close to 16,000 people in the capital under quarantine including labourers at a third construction site.
New measures for the construction industry are also being implemented.
Workers will now be transported by shuttle buses between dormitories and construction sites, while meals will be delivered to them.
The aim is to keep them in a closed environment to curb the spread of SARS.
The strict measures appear to be paying off as health authorities say the SARS outbreak has begun to peak in Beijing.
It saw 69 fresh cases and 4 deaths on Sunday after having reported well over 100 new cases daily in the past couple of weeks.
But while SARS may be coming under control in the capital city, concern has grown about its spread to the impoverished countryside and the government has tripled funds set aside to fight SARS.
As global research into the mysterious pneumonia-like illness continued, the Washington Post reported that the SARS virus can survive for hours on common surfaces outside the human body, and up to four days in human waste, evidence that may explain Hong Kong's particularly bad outbreak at a housing estate.
Scientific studies found the virus can survive for at least 24 hours on a plastic surface at room temperature, and can live for extended periods in the cold, the studies found.
"It's the first time we have hard data on the survival of the virus. Before, we were just speculating," said Klaus Stohr, the top researcher into the mystery virus for the World Health Organization.
05 May
Chinese Premier Wen warns SARS situation still grave
Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao has warned that the SARS situation in Beijing is still grave despite some progress and urged hard work at all levels to combat the disease.
Confidence in official government reports that SARS was being brought under control prompted many people in Beijing to lower their guard against the virus and take to the once-deserted streets.
But Premier Wen said the situation remained grave, the Xinhua news agency reported.
He made the comments during an inspection of Xiaotangshan Hospital which was built by more than 7,000 workers in eight days for SARS sufferers.
Beijing has the highest official death toll from SARS in China, with 103 dead and 1,897 confirmed cases.
Nine new SARS deaths and 160 new cases were reported in China on Monday, bringing the overall toll to 206 and the total cases to 4,280 in what remains the worst-affected country.
Nearly 16,500 people were quarantined on Monday in Beijing alone and, in the latest move, reservoirs were sealed off from the public to prevent the SARS virus from entering the city's water supply.
In the eastern Chinese city of Nanjing, 10,000 people were quarantined.
Meanwhile villagers in two remote areas destroyed quarantine centres and beat up officials, a sign that the disease is creating social instability across the country.
"Several people have been detained as a result of the incident," said a police official in Yuhuan county in eastern Zhejiang province.
In another incident, villagers rioted from April 25-28 in Linzhou city, central Henan province, ransacking a planned SARS quarantine centre and other medical facilities, a local Linzhou official said.
The Linzhou riot resulted in the sacking of two officials, he said.
At least 13 people were arrested.
China's state media said officials were also sacked in the northern Hebei province after a SARS patient was allowed to infect relatives.
11 May
Taiwan beefs up SARS control as WHO upgrades Taipei's SARS status
Taiwan unveils new anti-SARS measures as the World Health Organisation (WHO) upgrades capital Taipei to the category of "high" local transmission of the disease.
Among the measures was a plan to build up reporting networks and set up temperature checkpoints to contain the spread of SARS in local communities of the island's capital.
"In case transmission occurs in local communities, we fear the epidemic will spread to the central and southern areas and even worsen in the northern localities, which will be a disaster," Taiwan Premier Yu Shyi-kun told a press conference on Saturday.
Also on Saturday, the WHO website listed Taipei an area where "local probable cases occurred among persons who have not been previously identified as known contacts of probable SARS cases," just like Beijing, Guangdong, Shanxi and Hong Kong.
The reclassification followed WHO's issuance of a warning against non-essential travel to Taipei, where cases of Severe Respiratory Syndrome (SARS) were growing rapidly following two main outbreaks in two hospitals.
On Sunday, Taiwan reported 12 more SARS cases, bringing the total number to 184.
The number of SARS deaths was unchanged at 18, the Department of Health said.
Five of the new cases were linked to the Taipei Municipal Hoping Hospital, which was closed April 24 after an outbreak had been detected among its staff and patients.
The hospital, vacated Thursday after transferring all its 200 patients and 900 quarantined medical staff, will be disinfected and serve as a SARS-treatment centre.
WHO says China's SARS data leaves much to be desired as China reports 5 deaths
China said on Saturday five more people had died from SARS and another 85 were infected, taking the death toll to 235 and the number of cases to 4,884.
The Health Ministry said two of the new deaths were in Beijing, currently the hardest hit place in the world, along with 54 of the latest cases.
Beijing, the worst hit city in the world, now has 116 dead and 2,227 confirmed cases.
An additional 137 suspected cases were also noted, giving a nationwide tally of 2,526.
In a related development the World Health Organization said Saturday that Chinese data on the spread of Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome (SARS) still left much to be desired.
Most glaringly, authorities in the capital Beijing have no idea where half of the city's patients contracted the virus, WHO spokeswoman Mangai Balasegaram said.
She said a lot of vital data is still missing, meaning it is premature to say the situation in Beijing is improving as some local officials have suggested.
"You are dealing with a whole host of unknowns," she said. "When we deal with unknowns, we can't make clear conclusions."
Unprepared local hospitals, whose lack of control measures made them a breeding ground for the disease, were a major factor fueling the rapid spread of SARS in Beijing, James Maguire, a WHO virologist, said.
In the capital, a city of 13 million people, the problem was that ordinary patients seeking treatment for flu or other respiratory diseases - the early warning symptoms of SARS - were becoming infected with the atypical pneumonia after being grouped together with SARS patients during a chaotic period of diagnosis, he said.
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