This Canadian report doesn't sound good:
New SARS cluster in Toronto raises questions
By ALLISON LAWLOR
Globe and Mail Update and Canadian Press
Ontario health officials once again asked the public Tuesday to take extra precautions as they struggle to contain SARS after it spread to a religious group in Toronto.
James Young, the province?s commissioner of public security, urged people who think they might have severe acute respiratory syndrome to stay home and quarantine themselves.
?If you are feeling ill or have a fever, do not go to work, do not go to school, do not go out in the community. Wait until your illness is sorted out or you are feeling better,? Dr. Young told a news briefing.
Anyone who suspects they may have SARS should not use public transit to go to the doctor or the hospital, he added.
Dr. Young insisted that public health officials in Ontario ?have not lost control? of containing SARS as they struggle to contain a potentially large outbreak among a Catholic group. On Monday night health officials announced that 500 members of a Roman Catholic group were told to quarantine themselves after 29 of them and two doctors who treated them had been diagnosed as probable or suspect SARS cases.
Officials admitted that some members of the group should have been in isolation but had not been complying with the policy. In fact, officials obtained mandatory quarantine orders against two members who refused to isolate themselves, it was reported Tuesday.
Easter week is the most important in the Catholic calendar. Under normal circumstances, adherents would attend masses on Thursday, Friday and Sunday at a minimum.
Roman Catholic Bishop John Boissonneau attended the briefing by public health officials Tuesday and urged parishioners to stay in isolation if they?ve been directed to do so.
?We don?t want to jeopardize anyone else,? Bishop Boissonneau said.
?Some people may feel a certain tension or stress between what they regard as their religious duty and their public health duty. Let me tell you, their public health duty is their religious duty.?
SARS spread to the community after several members of the church attended a wake on April 3 for a person who, it was later learned, died of SARS. Some members of the deceased?s family were coming down with the disease at the wake; it appears they may have passed the infection to some people who attended.
The dead man had been cared for at Scarborough Grace in mid-March, when the infection was spreading through that facility.
Thirteen people in Canada -- all in the Toronto area -- have died after contracting the disease. The global death toll from severe acute respiratory syndrome has reached 154, and more than 3,000 people have been infected. Most victims have been in Asia.
Earlier in the day, Ontario Health Minister Tony Clement urged clinics to give priority to cancer patients, some of whom have had their treatments postponed by SARS scares at several Toronto-area hospitals.
?All the stops have to come out now,? said Donald Low, chief microbiologist at Toronto?s Mount Sinai Hospital. ?We have a short window of opportunity to try to contain this.?
Ontario Premier Ernie Eves on Tuesday paid a solidarity visit to Toronto?s Chinatown, eating lunch at a local restaurant and telling reporters ?SARS is not a disease peculiar to people from Asia or of Chinese descent.? I want to call on all Ontarians to support our Chinese community and put aside fears and prejudices. It?s time to dine and do business with our Chinese friends and neighbours all across this province,? Mr. Eves said after a meeting with Chinese community leaders.
Despite expressing his support, Mr. Eves said the province cannot afford to compensate everyone affected by fears over SARS. Provincial NDP Leader Howard Hampton called on Mr. Eves to convene an inquiry once the outbreak is brought under control, to ?ensure that we learn from this experience.?
?We must be assured that if an outbreak like this occurs again, our system will be even better prepared,? he said in an open letter to the Premier.
Meanwhile in Hong Kong, health officials announced Tuesday that nine people had died of SARS in the last 24 hours, the highest one-day death toll of the disease anywhere in the world. The victims include a number of young and otherwise healthy people, the first time the disease had made serious inroads into those groups. Doctors in Hong Kong said Tuesday that the rash of deaths shows that the public cannot assume that youth and good health will protect them. ?The public is getting a more realistic view of the disease now,? Dr. Lo Wing-lok, head of the Hong Kong Medical Association, told Agence France-Presse. ?It is being too wishful to think the virus can determine the age of the person to be infected. No one is exempted.?
The youngest SARS victim yet was a 32-year-old woman who died Tuesday in Hong Kong. Also among the dead, four of whom were in their 30s and 40s, was a pregnant woman whose baby was delivered by caesarian section and managed to survive, although it is not known whether the child has the disease. ?I think during the last couple of days, our concerns remain the number of deaths and of the people who died some of them were rather young,? Hospital Authority acting Chief Executive Ko Wing-man told a news conference.
?We?re worried about these people who are young,? Dr. Henry Yeung of the Hong Kong Doctors Union (HKDU) told an AFP correspondent, who reported that the territory had been ?shaken? by the sudden spike among younger people.
With reports from Associated Press
globeandmail.com |
