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medpundit |
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Tuesday, April 29, 2003Someplace, in the last few days, and I wish I had the source at hand, I saw that several Canadian nurses were infected because they were intubating an infected patient and he vomited on them. Even a newbie paramedic knows you take universal precautions when intubating a patient. Your points on the start of the Toronto situation are well taken, but I suspect that the above was only one of a few really, really stupid mistakes. And, yes, I would grant you that it could happen here. I would suggest that the U.S. has 41 plus cases and it doesn't appear to be happening here. Not necessarily the difference in medical systems, more like some half-assed medicine being practiced in Toronto. My big concern is Communist China. I do not believe their numbers at all, and suggest adding a zero to the right side of all their numbers, for a start. I don’t know about the Canadian nurses, but I still think the big difference between Canada and the U.S. when it comes to SARS was the timing. They had their first case long before it was recognized as a highly contagious, new disease. Our first cases were after the WHO alert. That makes all the difference in the world. The first Canadian patient wasn’t recognized as being potentially dangerous and highly infectious, through the fault of no one, and remained at large in the community until her death. In the U.S. we had the advantage of an advance warning from the WHO and could take precautions and quarantine patients before they infected people in their family or the community. We also may be classifying people as probable SARS who don’t really have it, but who have similar symptoms and a travel history that make them suspected cases. Until there’s a reliable diagnostic test, the true incidence will remain largely unkown. And Communist China? Who could ever trust a totalitarian regime? But there are some interesting developments in Canada: Canadian health officials, fighting a World Health Organization advisory warning people against traveling to Toronto, said today they will install advanced fever screening devices at airports in Vancouver and Toronto to try to halt the movement of people with SARS symptoms. What do you suppose “advanced fever screening devices” are? Last I checked the only device available for detecting fever was a thermometer. And although the WHO has advised people to stay away from Toronto, the Canadians are hoping to lure all the SARS experts of the world there: Canada also said today it will host a two-day international conference on SARS here starting Wednesday. Officials have invited representatives from WHO, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the Pan American Health Organization, and officials from China, Britain and Mexico. As long as they take anything China tells them with a grain of salt.... Evidently my fellow Ohioans aren’t letting some tiny old virus scare them away from one of their most popular weekend destinations: No prevention measures were evident at the border crossing between Ontario and New York state, where thousands of cars transit each day. Over the weekend health officials did not stop motorists and did not hand out information cards for travelers entering or leaving the country. The government has said it would monitor border crossings and would alert travelers about SARS. "We didn't get anything coming over," said Jolan Baranyai, who was riding with a busload of people from Cleveland. "We just blew right in. It was too easy." Neither Baranyai nor her friend Geneen Petrowski were concerned about contracting severe acute respiratory syndrome. "It's common sense," said Petrowski. "Anywhere you go, you can catch anything. The basic thing is wash your hands. My boss gave us all masks as a joke. They have holes in them so we could drink a drink through them." Ohioans like to go to Canada to gamble. Can you tell? UPDATE: A reader says that this is what is meant by "advanced fever screening devices" : Infrared thermography is a noninvasive diagnostic technique that provides a method to visualize and quantify changes in skin surface temperature. An infrared camera is used to convert infrared radiation emitted from the skin surface into electrical impulses that are presented in various colours on a monitor. This visual image graphically maps the body temperature and is referred to as a thermogram. The spectrum of colours indicates an increase or decrease in the amount of infrared radiation being emitted from the body surface. Since there is a high degree of thermal symmetry in the normal body, subtle abnormal temperatures can be easily identified, even in a crowd. Once a person is identified with a higher than normal thermal pattern they can be isolated and further evaluated. The portability of the Infrared Camera System makes it an ideal device for pre-screening, in-flight evaluation, and during disembarking. Interesting. UPDATE II: Chuck Simmins makes the point that Canada's death rate from SARS is higher than everyone else's: If you check the SARS numbers at the WHO site, you find two curiosities. Canada has the highest death rate in the world, nearly 19%. The US data is four days old. The CDC SARS page is no more current. I'm calling the death rate: deaths / (deaths plus recoveries), which I believe to be the correct method. He has the data displayed graphically here. posted by Sydney on 4/29/2003 08:07:00 AM 0 comments 0 Comments: |
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