Posted on 04/18/2003 6:47:57 PM PDT by CathyRyan
THE mother of a recovered Sars victim died on Wednesday. The question is: Could she have been saved?
She was placed under a home quarantine order with other members of the family. But despite Sars symptoms showing up, she ventured out of the house to see a general practitioner, and two days later, got a relative to drive her to the National University Hospital.
She must have been extremely ill, because she went straight into the intensive care unit. Now she is dead.
If she had told the health official checking up on her daily when she first started feeling unwell, she would have been rushed to Tan Tock Seng Hospital for screening. Treated early, she might have been saved. Who knows?
The family, we were told, was in denial.
And from what health officials tell us, that is generally the case for those who have contracted the disease. Nobody wants to come down with Sars; they prefer to cling to the belief that what they have is a garden-variety fever, and that that muscle ache is merely the onset of the common flu.
Because a few people did not obey their quarantine orders, electronic cameras are now installed in the homes of all quarantined, and wrist-tags slapped on repeat offenders.
Why not just throw the book at them instead of issuing a written warning or spending money on tracking technology? Or fine them $5,000 as allowed for under the Infectious Diseases Act? Home Affairs Minister Wong Kan Seng's answer to this: What if the person cannot pay the fine? Throw him into jail?
But the point is, there are reasons for guidelines and rules. They are not just to protect the person - but also others.
For instance, that feverish National Cancer Centre porter who did not return to the hospital staff clinic when told to do so put himself - and others - at risk.
He claimed his fever had subsided and went instead to a general practitioner on April 12. Two days later, he went back to the staff clinic and was admitted into TTSH with Sars.
'There were clear instructions given to all staff to return to the staff clinic for reviews and he did not. We take a very, very serious view about this,' said Dr Khoo Kei Siong, head of medical oncology of the National Cancer Centre.
But the porter had no fever, so he wouldn't be able to infect anyone then, could he?
Said Minister of State for Health, Dr Balaji Sadasivan: 'He self-reported that he had no fever so we don't have objective evidence whether he was having a fever or not.'
WASTED RESOURCES
THAT move by the hospital porter means this: The GP had to be tracked down and all his patients who turned up to see him that day too. The result is that 13 home quarantine orders were issued to the clinic's patients.
So much time and resources wasted - and probably a great deal of panic among the clinic's patients and staff - all because one man wouldn't do as told. Hospital staff tell of patients who will not tell the whole truth, such as whether they had been near Sars patients or come back from Sars-affected areas.
'It's very important for people when they are asked by the triage nurses in hospitals or polyclinics to be responsible and answer accurately so that they can be set aside,' said Professor Tan Chorh Chuan, Director of Medical Services.
'They will be treated in the same way, in fact they may get faster treatment. If they don't do that, then they could actually end up causing more problems for the medical staff.
'It creates a whole chain of problems because you then have to start contact tracing and you have to start calling people up and so on.'
To be kind, I can understand that these people are merely hoping that they do not have Sars. When seized by such fears, the impact of their actions on others is far from their minds.
But I cannot say the same for people who insist on barging into hospital wards at all hours of the day, some with children in tow, to visit patients, heedless of the impact their visits may have on those already extremely sick.
In these Sars days, fewer visitors mean less risk of infection. If visitors played by hospital rules, there wouldn't be any need for draconian measures that turn an army of nurses into security guards.
And for all you know, those who do play by the rules, might end up saving others - and their own lives too.
She would have been taken to a hospital. My spouse's great-grandparents came down with small pox on an relatively isolated farm in Nebraska in the 1910s. Food and mail would be delivered to their post box at the edge of the property. They stayed there in quarantine, not all came down with it, and thankfully, they all survived.
I can't imagine where in the United States a paper would print something as persnickety this, but -- I could see Hillary Clinton dictating the article.
No, I just wish I were tall, thin, blond, brilliant, and married to a very rich Jack Ryan. ROFL .
You too?
My grandmother was a bacteriologist at the Medical College of Georgia when the '18 pandemic came along. It delayed her marriage for two years.
It was a very traumatic experience for everybody at the College and associated hospital. Their patients were dying and they couldn't figure out what to do to stop it. It affected her tremendously -- she was very germophobic, I never washed my hands so much as I did at her house (which was spotless at all times).
Not just the family, the doctors too?
The laws are still on the books. I have a feeling they are about to be enforced again.
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