Ontario officials fear new SARS cluster

"As of June 9, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control reported 311 suspected SARS cases in the United States, 69 probable cases and no deaths. Yet Canada has had 33 deaths with a similar caseload, D'Cunha noted. " Does make one wonder, huh?
Makes me more than wonder, makes me puzzled. I can't think of an explanation for this. Even if the gov' is hiding cases and only the worst are being report, they would be the most likely to die, but there aren't any deaths.

paging FL_engineer...your thoughts please.

I don't have strong opinions on that any different than what the rest of you have already noted.

But note that U.S. has had roughly 32 active 'probable' cases for a VERY long time. Many of those 32 have been sick much longer than the average 'recovery' time.

And it is aggravating how secretive the U.S. has been with it's data. We 'may' have good health care but if so, we sure don't flaunt that with detailed data to prove the point.

Our own data reporting does not set a good example for other countries to follow.

Its funny, in that article in post 62, the journalist was fed Jason Blair style math, and he bought it!

...investigation into 144 SARS cases ... the vast majority (93.5%) of patients in our cohort survived," the researchers concluded. That means the SARS death rate for the people studied was 6.5%.

That's typical bogus spin.

If they were looking at data from April 29th, the first day where they had 144 probable cases, there were only 86 recoveries so far, and 20 deaths, so simple math would yield a death rate of 20/(20+86) or 19% !!!

Even if they cheated and included persons not yet recovered, and not yet dead, the rate would have STILL been 14%.

These people must have wanted to report the smallest possible death rate, so they used 'probable' cases PLUS 'suspected' cases.

That would be outrageously hypocritical. No one ever counts 'suspected' cases, especially when the suspected cases make you look bad, like when you are asking WHO to lift your travel restrictions!

Good to be watchful of journalistic excesses, but perhaps the 21 day data given in the actual JAMA report on the Toronto 144 by a couple dozen doctors is where you ought to point your criticism. 23% were still hospitalized after the 8 deaths cited. Did any die afterward? And what of the use of ribavirin and steroids, did they help significantly?

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