|
Two new canada cases { May 1 2003 } Original Source Link: (May no longer be active)
http://www.fftimes.com/index.php3/3/2003-05-01/13825http://www.fftimes.com/index.php3/3/2003-05-01/13825
Two new SARS cases emerge
May 01, 2003
TORONTO (CP)
There were stark reminders today that Toronto’s battle with SARS is not over, with the revelation that there may be two new cases among hospital workers.
That news followed closely on the heels of the announcement late yesterday that two more men had died of SARS.
One—a 39-year-old with no underlying medical problems—was the youngest person to die in the city’s seven-week long outbreak.
Those deaths brought the death toll here to 23.
The new SARS cases—one probable, one suspect—do not threaten to draw another travel advisory from the World Health Organization because they occurred in a contained health care setting and pose no risk of community spread.
“This is what happened in the past and what we’re hoping is that it’s under control [now],” said Dr. David Heymann, the WHO’s executive director of communicable diseases.
Heymann was in Toronto for a two-day Health Canada conference on SARS which concluded today.
“We believe that Canada’s doing the right things and they should have no further setbacks. But if they come, then there will be some fluke that’s caused it . . . for example, when nurses change their gowns, whether they’re getting infected at that time.”
A team of experts from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control is in Toronto studying infection control methods in SARS units with the aim of identifying how to stop transmission to health-care workers treating SARS patients.
But the suspect case, if confirmed, would prolong Toronto’s time on the WHO’s affected areas list. To become freed of that designation, the city’s outbreak must be declared contained.
That would require 20 days—two full incubation periods—of no new cases.
The suspect case is believed to have been infected on April 25. Prior to that, the last known onset of disease was in a health care worker exposed on April 20.
It remains to be seen if the suspect case is actually SARS, noted Dr. Donald Low, microbiologist-in-chief at Mount Sinai Hospital and a member of the SARS containment team.
“Somebody in another region [outside Toronto] has designated this as a suspect case, but I think it’s still tenuous as to whether or not this is a case,” Low insisted.
“It’s very early to say that [the person] doesn’t have another cause for this.”
While new cases among health-care workers are not entirely unexpected, Low admitted the development isn’t helpful as Toronto struggles to restore its tarnished reputation as a safe city to visit.
“[Optically], it’s terrible, yeah,” he said.
“The only positive thing I can say is that it’s not community [spread],” he added. “The unfortunate thing is that it sort of moves the yardsticks now up to the 25th of April, if this [suspect case] turns out to fall into that category.
“We just have to live with it,” he said, referring to the WHO’s affected list “for a couple more weeks.”
The new suspect case, whose file has not yet been fully reviewed by the team of SARS experts, is at home in isolation.
The probable case is more clear cut. A health-care worker who has been under investigation in hospital since April 13 developed symptoms and was moved onto the probable list, Low said.
He would not reveal the names of the hospitals where the two people worked.
|
|
