Hello Elmat, I am waiting to have a vivid surround sound dream sequence where I am trapped on an island, with people dying around me, fighting with a laser cannon against masses of nasty-looking giant virus floating around in air and scurrying on the ground; I will most likely see myself alternately jumping around on anti-gravity boots lasers blasting and hiding in the rubble, sniper rifle at ready.
I may have played one too many 3D first-person-shoot-them-up computer game;0)
For my trip to Beijing this Sunday, I got a new batch of 3M masks with exhale nose piece, medical gloves, surgical goggles (with pin holes for air intake from the bottom side). I will bet I will unsettle some passengers:0)
BTW, the mystery of Amoy Garden Block E is now clear, and I suppose drainage cleaning fluid and plumbing supply sales will now go through the roof, overflow the streets ... and my low density neighbor real estate should be revalued upward.
The word also is that China will ban the raising of chicken and pigs on the same premises so that chicken virus do not jump to pig, get transformed into something nastier still, and then jump on to humans.
hongkong.scmp.com
Thursday, April 17, 2003
Many factors contributed to Amoy Garden's Sars outbreak: report finds
KRISTINE KWOK
Updated at 6.39pm:
A number of factors contributed to the outbreak of atypical pneumonia in Ngau Tau Kok's Amoy Gardens - where 321 residents have been infected with the disease, a Government report revealed on Thursday.
Secretary for Health, Welfare and Food Yeoh Eng-kiong said the severe acute respiratory syndrome (Sars) was not transmitted through air, water or dust. Dr Yeoh said it was spread through Block E's sewage system and then later in common areas such as lifts and through person-to-person contact.
Investigators found the Sars virus in samples of human waste at Block E of the housing complex's sewage system, Dr Yeoh explained.
He attributed the spread of the virus to Amoy Gardens' u-shaped waste drainage pipe called a ''U-trap''. This is part of each apartment's toilet plumbing system. When the U-trap is filled with water, it blocks sewage odours from going back into the toilet. However, most of the ''U traps'' in Amoy Gardens were dry because of improper maintenance.
Dr Yeoh said Sars virus droplets contained in human waste were then flushed back into toilets on various floors.
Dr Yeoh said the index patient that spread the Sars virus to Amoy Gardens residents was a 33-year-old Shenzhen man with a history of chronic liver disease.
The man on March 14 and 19 visited his brother, who lives in Block E, and stayed the night. He was suffering from diarrhoea and used the toilet.
Dr Yeoh said about 40 per cent of the Sars cases in the housing complex came from Block E, and these were the first residents to be infected.
The virus was then spread to residents of other blocks in the estate through contaminated public areas, such as lifts, and through person-to-person contact. |
