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medpundit |
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Tuesday, April 01, 2003The Hong Kong Department of Health has today issued an unprecedented isolation order to prevent the further spread of Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome (SADS). The isolation order requires residents of Block E of Amoy Garden to remain in their flats until midnight on 9 April. The decision to issue the isolation order was made following a continued steep rise in the number of SARS cases detected in the building over the past few days. Concern about a possible outbreak in Amoy Garden mounted on Saturday, when 22 of Hong Kong's 45 new SAR cases hospitalized that day were determined to be residents of the estate. On Sunday, 36 of the 60 new patients admitted to hospital with probable SARS were Amoy Garden residents. Hong Kong health authorities today informed the public that a cumulative total of 213 residents of Amoy Garden had been admitted to hospital with suspected SARS since reporting on the disease began. Hong Kong's outbreak began on 12 March when health officials first recognized a cluster of cases of atypical pneumonia in the Prince of Wales Hospital. Of the 213 Amoy residents affected in the outbreak, 107 patients resided in Block E. In addition, most of these 107 patients from Block E lived in flats that were vertically arranged. That suggests that this virus can be transmitted through air ducts, which in turn suggests that you don't need much of a viral load to be infected. For most viruses, like colds, you have to come into contact with respiratory droplets - either by someone sneezing or coughing on you, or from touching someone's contaminated hand or lips, etc. (That's why it drives me crazy to see someone lick a page before turning it.) But, highly contagious diseases (such as smallpox) can cause infection with a minimal of contact because they don't require a huge glob of viral particles to start the infection. Rather worrisome. posted by Sydney on 4/01/2003 08:25:00 AM 0 comments 0 Comments: |
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