Orange County Issues SARS Alert (Florida)

Officials in Orange County issued a health alert for severe acute respiratory syndrome Thursday afternoon.

There's a probable case of SARS in isolation at an Orange County hospital, according to WESH NewsChannel 2 health reporter Dr. Todd Husty.

Although the case is not confirmed, health officials said they must take it seriously to protect the public. They're reportedly looking at every person the patient had contact with in the community.

Meanwhile, Toronto is the latest city to be placed on a travel advisory by the World Health Organization. Officials with the Orange County Health Department told WESH NewsChannel 2 that every person leaving Toronto will be checked for symptoms of SARS starting Friday.

Those symptoms include a fever of 100.4 or above, a dry cough, and difficulty breathing.

You ever looked at all the crap doctors get? Med alerts, various journals, plus the ads trying to get them to prescribe new stuff. They get way too much crap to be able to digest it all. My old GP used to take two vacations a year, one to catch up on his medical reading and one to actually have a vacation. So a bunch of people who probably hadn't had a chance to read the warnings about SARS didn't detect it until too late. Feces happens. The fact that Kwai spent 12 hours on a gurney shows these guys were pretty heavily over worked. it's an imperfect world and the methods of informing doctors about things are gloriously imperfect.

This does show why quarentines are so worthless though, hundreds of people exposed in one hospital before anybody even knows what's going on, if you're gonna quarentine you now have to track all of them down and everybody they've been in contact with and on and on and on. The disease will have run it's course before you've quarentined eveybody you need to.

No that's not my arguement. My arguement is that quarantines can't work except under very limited circumstances of locations that are already pretty isolated naturally. The government shouldn't waste tax dollars on things doomed to failure. Since quarantines can't work they should focus their efforts on things that can: cures and vaccines. Citizens should pay attention to math, the numbers on SARS quite simply don't match the panic, if you must panic about something make it something worthy of the rise in blood preasure. The fact that you are in a panic over this shows that indeed at least some people are so ignorant that any negative data what-so-ever will send them into a panic.

Ruthlessness?! Were they supposed to shoot and burn the victims. We've gota thread of one of the nurse's experience with this, she was there from the start and even got sick. According to her she hadn't even heard of SARS until after the guy sat in the emergency room for 12 hours. Like I said, medical professionals are inundated with information daily, and emergency room workers are also inundated with... well emergencies everyday. They don't necessarily have time to read and analyze every alert that comes from WHO and ProMed, they're a little busy putting people's guts back in after a traffic accident.

No I'm not more pessimisistic about the scope of the disease spread. I think you're going off half cocked over a non-issue. Average flus spread further faster and kill more people. I was outlining the absolute possible worst case scenario which I am 100% convinced won't even come close to happening because if you're going to do mass quarantining you MUST act as though the worst case scenario is the true scenario, otherwise your quarantine will fail and you'll have accomplished nothing.

History teaches us that the first people to panic are prone to making gigantic leaps of illogic based on scant information. They always insist they're the Little Dutch Boy, some are willing to admit they might be the Boy Who Cried Wolf, in truth they're Chicken Little.

After reading your posts, I have had to reexamine the philosophy, procedures, and efficacy of quarantine policies, past and present.

Quarantining an individual, or an area, as discostu points out, will not stop the spread of the disease. (By people who are infected and have already left the area, or escape after the quarantine is imposed.) However, as seamole points out, quarantining an individual, or an area, is meant to slow the spread of the disease by those known to be infected or exposed.

If this coronavirus is as contagious as some of the health experts fear, and their current barrier protection procedures are any indication, then an infected individual that had wandered around Disneyworld and the Epcot center for two or three days might have infected a large number of people that you couldn't determine or quarantine.

The fact that you couldn't stop everyone that might have been exposed is still no reason not to quarantine the patient to prevent THEM from infecting MORE people. This DOESN'T stop the spread, it stops THIS individual from infecting others.

At this point in time, the size of the available data base makes prediction, statistical or otherwise, difficult at best.

It appears to me that the WHO, and other health officials, are terrified that this could turn into something similar to the Spanish influenza pandemic that killed 20 million people worldwide in 1918.

According to the reports I've seen, the coronavirus is similar to what, essentially, causes the common cold. As this primarily causes discomfort and almost everyone recovers, very little research has been done on this virus. Which means, basically, that the health care professionals, and industry, are helpless at this time if this disease expands exponentially in the world population.

IF it does expand exponentially, (still a significant if), then the transmission factor, and mortality rate, could still change drastically if the virus mutates further as it spreads through the population.

The current numbers don't warrant the attention the media has given this. (Although it is a great story for fear and ratings.) But that doesn't mean it won't become a major disaster. (If you extrapolate the 1918 numbers to todays global population, you'll see what I mean.)

To me, for now, it's a bit of a media circus spreading fear, uncertainty and doubt.

One one thousandth of one percent (0.001%) of the approximate six billion global population would be 60,000 cases. (That's ten cases per million people.) If THAT happens, then the contagion and mortality factors should be better understood and have some significance, and then I will give heed to the statistics.

Because of the tilt of the conversation my position probably looks more extreme than it really is. By no means am I against quarantining people we know have SARS, nor even people we're pretty sure have SARS, nor am I against quarantining high percentage candidates (like people living with people we know have SARS). These are good normal intelligent steps to take against a contagious disease of largely unknown characteristics that has proven to be fatal at least once. What I'm against are the mass quarantines being advocated by many, not letting anybody in from China, sealing off Toronto. These are drastic measures that in our current world simply won't work and could cause civil panic which could easily cause more deaths than SARS, human society and technology has moved far past the point where that kind of action is desirable or even possible.

As for the rest, I'm with you. The numbers of SARS cases in the last two months (and the number of SARS deaths) pale in comparisson to the annual flu outbreak (or, if you believe the headlines the annual WORST FLU EVER). Something less contagious, less fatal and all around less dangerous (at least by the data we currently have which is admittedly a little skinny) than the flu simply doesn't warrant the attention SARS is getting or the fear it's generating.

So far your the only one posting anything about money and government response.

It is time we all remembered the past lessons of allocating funds and resources to issues of less importance than other issues. Again, the breast cancer situation is a great example. A disproportionally huge amount of money has been spent researching and screening for breast cancer despite the fact that significantly fewer women are affected by it than by other cancers and heart disease. Realistically, too, SARS contraction fears are keeping some people from going to doctors for care of other diseases.

As you say, the "tilt of the conversation" may have led to an impression that your position was more extreme than intended.

I suspect, and hope, that seamole's was also.

Although I changed my first draft, I originally wrote that I felt you both had made valid points, and I thought that the reasonable course lay somewhere in the gray area between the extremes.

I think we are in agreement that, at this point, there is a dearth of significant data on which to extrapolate the real impact this virus will have.

Without additional facts or more data, it is difficult to calm the fears of those who are truly alarmed. Also, without those facts, it is difficult to say their fears are unfounded.

Until many more cases are accurately diagnosed, the true contagion and mortality rates, as well as potential mutation factors and general species resistance factors, will continue to be unknowns.

In my opinion, the fear factor will continue to be an emotional one that, whether the response is apathy or alarm, can't be argued or mitigated with the information currently available.

Unfortunately, as demonstated here, this can cause vehement disagreements between intelligent and compassionate individuals. Similarly, and more distressing, these same disagreements can occur between medical professionals, leading to more fear and anxiety in the general public.

Good points about funding for perceived "health emergencies".

There are several potential political and financial agendas here for the conspiracy inclined. (At this point it doesn't mean they're wrong, either.)

One could be the desire for the UN, or one of it's agencies, to reclaim relevance on the world stage. This could facilitate obtaining additional financing from the UN, which NOT coincindentally would mean larger financial support from the USA, adding to the burden of our current international policies. (Remember, China is not our friend, even though they have been given permanent "Favored Nation" trading status.)

Recent public reaction to the WTO, and the perceived impotence of the UN security council, could be influencing promotion of an agency of the UN that is viewed as being more beneficial, less threatening to national sovereignty, and more effective, in a global role. (Coincidentally providing more influence to other UN bodies.)

The accusation by the WHO that China withheld information could be perceived as a ploy by China to enhance UN influence and power, in an attempt to further marginalize recent unilateral US international actions.

Notably, the CDC is not seeking additional funding for the emergency, but is providing assistance through dispatching technical personnel and providing analysis resources.

Of course, this conspiracy theory, like most, is most effectively debunked by considering the complexity and intelligence required, and the much higher probability that the simple explanation is stupidity, fear, and bureaucratic inefficiency.

FWIW

Problem is that the "news" media is always afraid to miss the next big story, so since SARS could arguably turn into the end of the world plague no one dares not cover it, and "cover it" always has an understood "constantly" at the end of the sentence. This of course makes things seem bigger, especially to your hardcore news junky like on FR, people are going to hear about the same three deaths over and over until somebody else dies (same thing happened with the Iraq war, same thing happened in Afghanistan, some thing happened with the shark scare of 2001) and they alway play with the phrasing to try to make it sound like new news so if you're not paying close attention you'll think it's a different 3 death. This creates panic, then even after you learn that it's the same deaths you're still left with the panic (panic, much like liberals, doesn't respond to logic or reason).

I often think one of the worst things to happen to this country was getting 3 24/7 news networks, when there wasn't competition there wasn't such a desperate need to beat a story to death. They have that desperate need to be first, first to spot the story, first to report the story, first to predict what's going to happen, first to spew the latest development, first to everything. And with the internet even the previously calm print media gets into the need to be first. Nobody can afford to take the time to develop a story and get the information right before opening their yap. That's what we have to do, don't panic until the story is developed and we have useful information, and remember if it just got published on the net or announced on TV 5 minutes ago it's probably BS.

Off topic, but I think your last post deals with an essential aspect of the new "information" age.

Ratings, and dollars, are now less with news "scoops" as in the old print news days, and more with ratings. In our current "reality TV", fast everything public mindset, 24/7 news is competing with network "reality" game shows.

Considered and intelligent evaluation of current events, taken with more time and information, has been abandoned for the fast news "fix" and hype on the latest isolated fact.

I wish I could say I was immune from this influence, but unfortunately I can't.

One of the things that moderates this influence is bulletin boards such as this.

Stating your opinions, and reactions, and considering the responses of others, helps to provoke more individual analysis and consideration of "big picture" perspective.

Although there is an unabashed bias in this forum, it is, in my opinion, a very valuable resource to evaluate and consider current events and the various media presentations and perspectives.

As a recent participant, this is just my way to say thanks to all the Freepers for their honest, and often insightful, opinions and perspectives.

The debate on the quarantine issue on this thread is a perfect example of honestly held, but extremely opposed viewpoints, that helps me refine that "middle ground" position that I consider most viable, tenable, and realistic.

Thank you,
GB7

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