Killer-flu a 'white terror': Expert, "It is the worst medical disaster I have ever seen."

Herald Sun ^ | 03-27-03

[Mother Abigail]

Killer-flu a 'white terror': Expert

By Catherine Armitage, Leigh Dayton

The Prince of Wales Hospital, where Dr Chung treats SARS patients, has had 69 medical staff struck down by the illness.

"I feel terrible seeing my colleagues struck down one after another," Dr Chung said. He said one doctor's lung function was "totally destroyed", highlighting the stress such cases cause among professionals.

China admitted yesterday that the number of mainland deaths was almost five times the number previously acknowledged and infections were double the number revealed by officials until now.

Guangdong officials point to news reports that said 24 people had died and 680 had been infected in that city by the end of February. SARS is poorly understood and scientists have yet to nail down its cause.

Chairman of the Communicable Disease Network of Australia David Smith said it was not unlike the beginning of the AIDS epidemic.

As with HIV-AIDS, medical and health professionals were struggling to pin down the infectious organism and must work with "very broad" definitions of the symptoms, Associate Professor Smith said.

Once experts identified the pathogen, along with its origin and behaviour, they would be better able to treat SARS and prevent its spread.

But progress is being made. Experts now know masks, gowns and protective clothing limits the disease's spread.

A World Health Organisation team has arrived in Beijing to help scientists with laboratory work and review evidence linking the Guangdong and Hong Kong outbreaks.

Australia's WHO team leader John Mackenzie, of the University of Queensland, said his Chinese colleagues had provided "very good data" on the Guangdong outbreak between November and February, but there was a "long way to go".

In Australia, three people are under investigation, but so far no cases have been confirmed.

[WriteOn]

'white terror': isn't that the chinese nickname for caucasians?

[marshmallow]

Given the origin of this outbreak, I think that "yellow peril" might be more accurate.

[Mother Abigail]

WHO hoped further tests over the next couple of weeks would determine whether one was the culprit, whether it was a combination of both or if their presence was just a coincidence.

And an effective treatment is still lacking. Although some hospitals had been using the antiviral drug Ribavirin, Salter said that WHO felt clinical testing should be carried out to discover whether it really was the answer.

"We have no significant information yet to show that it is effective," he said.

[Cicero]

It's obviously too late to contain this disease. And it's pretty late to start identifying it and developing a vaccine. China has a lot to answer for.

Then again, China has been brewing new flu strains for a century or more, and nobody has tried to do anything to correct the situation.

[Mother Abigail]

Stones go ahead with Singapore show

SINGAPORE (AP) -- The Rolling Stones were going ahead with a concert in Singapore Wednesday despite an outbreak of deadly flu in the city state that has claimed one life and pushed more than 700 people into quarantine.

" Please allow me to introduce myself..."

[TaxRelief]

Mother Abigail is trying to freak you all out!

[Capt. Tom]

'white terror': isn't that the chinese nickname for caucasians?

In Cantonese it sounds like yang guay- it translates to white devil. Maybe a chinese freeper could help us out. - tom

[Goodlife]

Yay communism, huh?

Keep your people in utter squalor until disease breaks out, and then hide the outbreak because you don't evil capitalist running-dog pigs to think there might be something wrong with your system. I bet the death count in China is many multiples of what they say it is.

[Diogenesis]

[Snowy]

I think it's time to give "The Stand" another read.

[Cicero]

Well, these things do happen. But unfortunately the Chinese kept it hidden for several months.

No, that's just my personal opinion. What with the Canadian and other cases, the difficulty if not impossibility of shutting down all travel through Singapore and China, I don't think there's a chance of isolating this disease.

[TaxRelief]

Population of China 1.3 billion. # of cases of SARS in China 800 since November. Risk of contracting SARS to date, not allowing for mismangement of disease, 6 in 10,000,000, if you live in China.

[Thud]

ping

[cherry]

"But unfortunately the Chinese kept it hidden for several months."

if they kept it hidden for several months, its not much of an epidemic , is it?

[JoeSchem]

Calling Captain Tripps.

[TaxRelief]

Aaaaaaaahhhhhhhhh! Watch out for the monkeys and all their little diseases! Killer-flu...

[uncitizen]

'white terror': isn't that the chinese nickname for caucasians?

Isn't it "white devil, white devil"? (source: Ace Venture, When Nature Calls)

[maestro]

I think the 1918 'outbreak' was via 'Horse' dung particles airborn because of the mass 'burning' of the dung?

[Mother Abigail]

 

China reveals much larger outbreak _ 34 deaths, 792 cases _ and WHO confirms it's SARS

For the first time, Chinese government officials revealed Wednesday that nearly three dozen people have died and almost 800 became ill in a mysterious outbreak that Western medical investigators confirm was the beginning spread of a new flu-like disease.

The new numbers raised the worldwide death total from severe acute respiratory syndrome, or SARS, to 51, with 1,325 cases since mid-November.

Until now, Chinese authorities said only five people had died from a pneumonia-like illness that struck southern Guangdong province. The new count of 34 includes three deaths in Beijing.

"Everything we've seen so far indicates it's the same disease," said Dr. Meirion Evans, member of a WHO team that has studied the cases in southern China.

"We're getting a more complete picture. It's certainly been one of the objectives of the mission to clarify whether the outbreak in China was the same disease as what's been seen outside of China."

For weeks, Chinese officials said only 305 people were sickened in an outbreak that started in November.

But a spokeswoman for the Guangzhou city government, who identified herself only by the surname Ye, said Wednesday that 792 cases of atypical pneumonia were reported in the province by the end of February, putting the worldwide case number at more than 1,300.

Health authorities in Hong Kong have said the disease spread when a sick Beijing professor stayed at the Metropole Hotel in late February, infecting six other guests, who then carried it to Singapore, Vietnam and Canada.

World Health Organization scientists say the disease spreads when victims cough or sneeze in close contact with others. Most SARS victims have been family members of those who have the disease or health workers treating them.

But the spread among strangers in the Hong Kong hotel and among nine tourists on a March 15 China Air flight from Hong Kong to Beijing has heightened fears.