foray
Rock n' Roll Doggie
When we first posted that thread about this latest worldwide virus, SARS, 9 people in the world had died from it. Since then, the number has gone up to at least 17 by my own counting.
http://smh.com.au/articles/2003/03/27/1048653791060.html
Simon Loh was a pastor from Faith Assembly of God Church. Many of my friends go there. Most of my beloved are in Singapore...
From the WHO website :
Q : Should we be worried ?
A : This illness can be severe and, due to global travel, has spread to several countries in a relatively short period of time. However, SARS is not highly contagious when protective measures are used, and the percentage of cases that have been fatal is low. Since the WHO global alert issued on 15 March , only isolated cases have been identified and no secondary outbreaks have occurred.
foray
http://smh.com.au/articles/2003/03/27/1048653791060.html
Singapore closes schools to stop public panic
March 27 2003
Singapore: Singapore today closed all schools - from daycare centres to junior colleges - in a bid to prevent public panic after a mystery flu-like illness killed two people in the city-state.
The parents of some 600,000 school children were scrambling to make care arrangements after the government announced the closures late yesterday.
The closures are the latest in a series of aggressive moves by the Singapore government to combat the spread of the illness, known as severe acute respiratory syndrome, or SARS. Officials stressed the schools were being closed to calm concerned parents, not on medical grounds.
The schools will remain closed until at least April 6, and officials will decide next week whether to extend the closures, Minister of State for Education and Manpower Ng Eng Hen told reporters.
The city-state of 4 million people has also ordered more than 860 people who may have been exposed to infected people to stay home for 10 days or risk prosecution and has closed one of its main hospitals to all patients except SARS cases.
Medical officials told reporters that they have recorded 74 SARS cases and have put an additional 40 patients into isolation who are suspected of having the disease, but have yet to be fully diagnosed.
Two have died from the illness and nine people are in intensive care, according to health ministry figures.
"This is not something you should panic over," Minister of State for National Development Vivian Balakrishnan told a news conference.
"The closure of schools and home quarantines are measures which exceed those taken by any other government in the world right now," Balakrishnan said. "Perhaps we are being excessively cautious, but that is in the nature of Singapore."
The Singapore deaths brought the total number of people killed by the mystery flu-like illness to 53 worldwide yesterday after the World Health Organisation said for the first time that cases that were called atypical pneumonia in southern mainland China were part of the same outbreak.
Health Ministry officials said they had no information about the two people who died, but local newspapers identified them today as Joseph Mok, 50, and Simon Loh, 39.
Mok was the father of one of Singapore's first three SARS patients who is believed to have contracted the disease on a trip to Hong Kong last month, the Straits Times reported. Neither his wife nor daughter could attend his cremation yesterday because they are hospitalised, the newspaper said.
Loh, a pastor, contracted SARS after he went to the hospital to pray for Mok's daughter, the report said.
Simon Loh was a pastor from Faith Assembly of God Church. Many of my friends go there. Most of my beloved are in Singapore...
From the WHO website :
Q : Should we be worried ?
A : This illness can be severe and, due to global travel, has spread to several countries in a relatively short period of time. However, SARS is not highly contagious when protective measures are used, and the percentage of cases that have been fatal is low. Since the WHO global alert issued on 15 March , only isolated cases have been identified and no secondary outbreaks have occurred.
foray