[Mitchell]

Thanks for the ping. This is an interesting article.

I'm curious about a couple of things.

This article, like many others, says that China is especially vulnerable because of poor medical facilities in rural areas. I suspect that this is backwards; I'd guess that, in fact, the crowded cities are where the epidemic would be. (In fact, the concentration of SARS patients in densely populated hospitals may have facilitated its spread; nurses and doctors are especially at risk. In that sense, the medical care provided may actually have made the situation worse by causing many more people to be infected, even though it presumably saved the lives of many of those who were infected.)

As for Canada, I have no doubt that socialized medicine is a terrible system and that Toronto made a series of systematic blunders in dealing with SARS. But why hasn't SARS emerged as a major problem in any other Canadian cities? Vancouver, for instance, also has a large Asian population.

This says that the SARS outbreak in Toronto cannot be attributed just to the floundering Canadian medical system and to the general commitment in Canada to political correctness. I think Toronto must have been particularly unlucky in some way with regard to SARS exposure or vulnerability, or the socialized medical care is institutionally worse there than in the rest of Canada for some reason.

[Allan]

But why hasn't SARS emerged as a major problem in any other Canadian cities?
Vancouver, for instance, also has a large Asian population.

This says that the SARS outbreak in Toronto cannot be attributed
just to the floundering Canadian medical system
and to the general commitment in Canada to political correctness.
I think Toronto must have been particularly unlucky in some way
with regard to SARS exposure or vulnerability
or the socialized medical care is institutionally worse there
than in the rest of Canada for some reason.

I believe there were only two cases of people
arriving in Canada with 'SARS'.
One in Vancouver
where it didn't get out of hand
one in Toronto
where it did.

I don't think one can make any judgements from just two cases.
(Also, I don't know which city got it first
though I believe it was Toronto).

Also
I don't blame Toronto's problems on Canada's health care system.
That is secondary.
The problem is a result of the complacent stupidity, sloth and slow-wittedness of Canadians
and the operation of the health-care system is a symptom
not the cause.

[Allan]

But why hasn't SARS emerged as a major problem in any other Canadian cities?
Vancouver, for instance, also has a large Asian population.

This says that the SARS outbreak in Toronto cannot be attributed
just to the floundering Canadian medical system
and to the general commitment in Canada to political correctness.
I think Toronto must have been particularly unlucky in some way
with regard to SARS exposure or vulnerability
or the socialized medical care is institutionally worse there
than in the rest of Canada for some reason.

An update from Canada's National Post 2003-04-30.
(Barry Cooper and David Bercuson. An update.)

Once the new disease was recognized
WHO issued several reports
four of them by late February.

The BC Centre for Disease Control alerted provincial health care providers
telling them to be on the lookout for an unusual flu.

In early March
when a patient expressing the appropriate symptoms showed up
he was masked and isolate.

A few days earlier
a similarly infected patient had come to Scarborough Grace Hospital.
But because the front line Ontario health care providers were uninformed
of WHO reports
they did not treat him properly
which made all the difference.

The Toronto medical officer of health refused to "speculate"
on why no one had passed on the message.
The Ontario medical commissioner blamed the hospital.
It was clear to everyone but the medical bureaucrats
that they had badly fumbled.
Just like the Chinese
they were deep into denial and damage control.

In this sense
the WHO was consistent in treating Toronto and Canton the same way.