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SARS coverup in the US ?

4/25/2003 5:29 PM
anonymous	SARS coverup in the US ? I’ve heard some rumors today that there is a SARS related story about to break in the US media. Apparently US Health officials altered the criteria for SARS infection identification in order to limit the impact on urban US economies. They also influenced the WHO to identify Toronto as a mechanism to deflect attention. It seems the boneheads thought they were dealing with a flu outbreak and that it would have quick flare-up and then go away. Yeah, right! Anyway – has anyone heard about this?

4/25/2003 5:29 PM

anonymous

SARS coverup in the US ?

I’ve heard some rumors today that there is a SARS related story about to break in the US media.
Apparently US Health officials altered the criteria for SARS infection identification in order to limit the impact on urban US economies. They also influenced the WHO to identify Toronto as a mechanism to deflect attention. It seems the boneheads thought they were dealing with a flu outbreak and that it would have quick flare-up and then go away.
Yeah, right!
Anyway – has anyone heard about this?

4/25/2003 6:58 PM
LFOscalator	Yesterday I saw the blurb about Toronto as well. In any event that's awful close to home. Can't be too far away from the US in a big way. LFO

4/25/2003 9:10 PM
Mark Hammer	There is little or no evidence that the W.H.O. people have visited Toronto or are well-informed about what is being done there to contain S.A.R.S.. In contrast, officials from CDC in Atlanta have stayed in close contact with Toronto and visited (some are there now), and are of the opinion that the W.H.O travel advisory is uncalled for. As far as anyone knows, this is the first time the W.H.O. has made such a pronouncement. Some would take that as evidence of the seriousness of the situation. Others, perhaps a bit better informed, take it as a sign of an error and over-reaction. In fact one of the primary pieces of justification for the W.H.O. advisory was the appearance of a single case showing up in the Philipines of a woman who had come from Toronto, and who is suspected of a) having S.A.R.S. (though not confirmed yet), and b) having brought it (whatever IT is) with her from Toronto. No one has any evidence that she did not catch it on the way to the Philipines. I should also point out that the public health officials in Toronto and for the province of Ontario have been saying from the get-go that their criteria for "suspected" cases are broader than the criteria used in other locales and countries so one should expect a higher apparent incidence in Toronto. The provincially mandated info-sheet I had to fill out the other day when I went to the doctor (300 miles away from Toronto) provided a checklist of symptoms so broad that the only people who apparently have permission to visit a hospital or doctor are those in perfect health. If you feel "stiff", or have a headache, or feel tired, or have a cough that started a couple days ago, you count as a potential case and are supposed to stay away. The economic impact of the W.H.O. advisory is immense (imagine what would happen to Florida if all tourists were warned to stay away and all locals were panicky about going out), and quite frankly the risk to health for all those people in the region who can't get to medical help for whatever it is that ails them because of all the special steps that have been taken to prevent spread (and we have one confirmed death of someone who was unable to get a coronary bypass procedure in a timely manner) is probably far greater than the threat posed by S.A.R.S itself. I hasten to remind folks that the majority of those affected are health care workers, NOT members of the public at large, and that the vast majority of folks who have succumbed to it were elderly people already in hospital for something else. One of last week's fatalities (out of 16 suspected SARS-related deaths, total) was *99 years old*. We are not talking about young folks minding their own business in the supermarket dying 5 days later. We are talking about people in health care settings whose health was already compromised being hastened to the grave a little faster by something on top of whatever was already compromising their health. There were most likely 20 times as many people in the same age and health bracket last week in the same region who died from pneumonia (like they do every week). No one seems to have noted that. I'm not trying to gloss over the seriousness of it, but one needs to understand "epidemics" and risk in relative terms. Within the discipline of public health, things get called epidemics when their incidence changes at faster than a certain rate. The number of actual cases that translates into at that "rate" may be puny compared to other known (but steady) sources of risk but it qualifies as an epidemic based on the quantitative rule of thumb used within that discipline. Bottom line Toronto is safe the same way crossing the street is safe: obey the rules of good judgment, keep your eyes peeled, and no harm will come to you. As an aside, my wife works in a research lab attached to a hospital here in Ottawa. To go in to the lab on a Sunday for 5 minutes to inject her 8 mice, she has to go through the standard S.A.R.S. check-in for all hospital staff and visitors, fill out the info sheet, and "anoint" herself with anti-viral/anti-bacterial substances, all of which takes longer than her work. I might point out that there are no patients in her building and she is able to go to work and come home each day without ever entering the hospital but for the requirement to do the SARS check-in, which I might note is taking place 300 miles from the caseload epicentre. I mention this not to whine about the extra time and effort. Rather, the extra steps that are taken everywhere within spitting and commuting distance of large cities these days, is the very thing one does to simply reduce bacterial transmission in general. I wonder if the rate of infection of some other more common viruses and bacteria will drop off in this period when we look back on the data in a year? There was a study conducted in Atlanta after the Olympics that is relevant here. Individual traffic was reduced dramatically for the period surrounding the Olympics to facilitate mass transit. When they took the measurements pre, during, and post, the traffic reduction resulted in diminished pollution indices for the region, and surprise surprise, a statistically significant reduction in hospital admissions for asthma and other respiratory diseases, particularly among children during that period of reduced pollution. Once in a while nature or history foists an experiment on you and you find out some interesting things. I'm curious to see what the personal hygiene frenzy will tell us when things die down in a month or two.

4/25/2003 9:10 PM

Mark Hammer

There is little or no evidence that the W.H.O. people have visited Toronto or are well-informed about what is being done there to contain S.A.R.S.. In contrast, officials from CDC in Atlanta *have* stayed in close contact with Toronto and visited (some are there now), and are of the opinion that the W.H.O travel advisory is uncalled for. As far as anyone knows, this is the first time the W.H.O. has made such a pronouncement. Some would take that as evidence of the seriousness of the situation. Others, perhaps a bit better informed, take it as a sign of an error and over-reaction. In fact one of the primary pieces of justification for the W.H.O. advisory was the appearance of a single case showing up in the Philipines of a woman who had come from Toronto, and who is suspected of a) having S.A.R.S. (though not confirmed yet), and b) having brought it (whatever IT is) with her from Toronto. No one has any evidence that she did not catch it on the way to the Philipines.

I should also point out that the public health officials in Toronto and for the province of Ontario have been saying from the get-go that their criteria for "suspected" cases are broader than the criteria used in other locales and countries so one should expect a higher apparent incidence in Toronto. The provincially mandated info-sheet I had to fill out the other day when I went to the doctor (300 miles away from Toronto) provided a checklist of symptoms so broad that the only people who apparently have permission to visit a hospital or doctor are those in perfect health. If you feel "stiff", or have a headache, or feel tired, or have a cough that started a couple days ago, you count as a potential case and are supposed to stay away.

The economic impact of the W.H.O. advisory is immense (imagine what would happen to Florida if all tourists were warned to stay away and all locals were panicky about going out), and quite frankly the risk to health for all those people in the region who can't get to medical help for whatever it is that ails them because of all the special steps that have been taken to prevent spread (and we have one confirmed death of someone who was unable to get a coronary bypass procedure in a timely manner) is probably far greater than the threat posed by S.A.R.S itself. I hasten to remind folks that the majority of those affected are health care workers, NOT members of the public at large, and that the vast majority of folks who have succumbed to it were elderly people already in hospital for something else. One of last week's fatalities (out of 16 suspected SARS-related deaths, total) was 99 years old. We are not talking about young folks minding their own business in the supermarket dying 5 days later. We are talking about people in health care settings whose health was already compromised being hastened to the grave a little faster by something on top of whatever was already compromising their health. There were most likely 20 times as many people in the same age and health bracket last week in the same region who died from pneumonia (like they do every week). No one seems to have noted that.

I'm not trying to gloss over the seriousness of it, but one needs to understand "epidemics" and risk in relative terms. Within the discipline of public health, things get called epidemics when their incidence changes at faster than a certain rate. The number of actual cases that translates into at that "rate" may be puny compared to other known (but steady) sources of risk but it qualifies as an epidemic based on the quantitative rule of thumb used within that discipline.

Bottom line Toronto is safe the same way crossing the street is safe: obey the rules of good judgment, keep your eyes peeled, and no harm will come to you.

As an aside, my wife works in a research lab attached to a hospital here in Ottawa. To go in to the lab on a Sunday for 5 minutes to inject her 8 mice, she has to go through the standard S.A.R.S. check-in for all hospital staff and visitors, fill out the info sheet, and "anoint" herself with anti-viral/anti-bacterial substances, all of which takes longer than her work. I might point out that there are no patients in her building and she is able to go to work and come home each day without ever entering the hospital but for the requirement to do the SARS check-in, which I might note is taking place 300 miles from the caseload epicentre.

I mention this not to whine about the extra time and effort. Rather, the extra steps that are taken everywhere within spitting and commuting distance of large cities these days, is the very thing one does to simply reduce bacterial transmission in general. I wonder if the rate of infection of some other more common viruses and bacteria will drop off in this period when we look back on the data in a year? There was a study conducted in Atlanta after the Olympics that is relevant here. Individual traffic was reduced dramatically for the period surrounding the Olympics to facilitate mass transit. When they took the measurements pre, during, and post, the traffic reduction resulted in diminished pollution indices for the region, and surprise surprise, a statistically significant reduction in hospital admissions for asthma and other respiratory diseases, particularly among children during that period of reduced pollution.

Once in a while nature or history foists an experiment on you and you find out some interesting things. I'm curious to see what the personal hygiene frenzy will tell us when things die down in a month or two.

4/25/2003 10:48 PM
LFOscalator	Potential cases are now showing up in NYC. http://story.news.yahoo.com/fc?cid=34&tmpl=fc&in=Health&cat=Severe_Acute_Respiratory_Syndrome This has the potential to sweep through our cities and cause some major havoc. LFO

4/25/2003 9:14 PM
terri cloth	michael jackson knew about SARS before anybody. why didn't he tell the public?!

4/27/2003 8:24 PM
Steve A.	Silver lining in the clouds... Karaoke parlors, movie theaters and discos shut their doors Sunday under orders from Beijing officials trying to contain the spread of SARS, which claimed more lives in the Chinese capital, Hong Kong, Taipei and Singapore. How can anything that causes karaoke parlors to close be completely bad??? Steve Ahola

4/28/2003 2:52 AM
Dai Hirokawa	[QUOTE] How can anything that causes karaoke parlors to close be completely bad??? Steve Ahola[/QUOTE] Hear hear! Dai

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