Posted on 04/26/2003 7:26:57 PM PDT by Lessismore
The worldwide SARS death toll continued to climb on Saturday as a leading British expert warned the mortality rate from the mysterious disease could be double that suggested by the World Health Organisation (WHO).
Canada recorded its 20th death, a 77-year-old man from Ontario province, casting doubt on official comments that the outbreak is under control.
Six deaths in Hong Kong and Singapore's 19th fatality were among 15 fatalities in Asia, bringing the global toll to 292.
As US President George W Bush offered to help beat the epidemic in China, where drastic measures are being taken to halt the rampant severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS), a British expert on infectious diseases said the mortality rate had reached 10 per cent - double WHO estimates.
"If one looks carefully at the WHO figures on mortality and recovery rates, it is running, unfortunately, at 10 per cent," Professor Roy Anderson of Imperial College said.
WHO, which said on Friday the mortality rate had reached 5-6 per cent, did not confirm Dr Anderson's figures, but said they appeared plausible.
"We have not seen the report so we could not comment except to say that this is a top-class professional and any figure he commits himself to is likely to be as close as possible to accurate," said Dick Thompson, spokesman for the WHO's communicable disease section.
Asian nations earlier vowed to form a united front to halt the spread of the killer virus as the WHO called for a global hunt to track down every case of the disease.
The determined pledge came at the end of a meeting of Asian health ministers and international experts in Kuala Lumpur.
The respiratory illness that first emerged in the southern Chinese province of Guangdong nearly six months ago has now infected nearly 5,000 people in 26 countries.
Several governments have already introduced sweeping emergency measures to curb the spread of the disease, quarantining thousands of people and sealing off entire buildings, hospitals and schools.
The health ministers meeting in Kuala Lumpur ahead of an emergency regional summit in Bangkok next week turned their attention to the problem of preventing the virus from spreading internationally.
In a communiqué issued after the meeting, the 10-member Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) plus China, Japan and South Korea affirmed the need to bar SARS suspects from going to other countries.
Would that be: Stephen King?
Well you never know do you?
The cure or vaccine for SARS will come from the US and its scientists, such things just about always do. As usual the world will take it then complain how evil we are.
No question that would be a tragic situation. The spread in hospitals isn't that surprising either, considering that most hospitalized people are in a weakened state too.
The spread among hospital workers is somewhat surprising to me though.
Good observations.
You might also note that Hong Kong, although technically a "separate" administrative region, is still part of China. The Chinese sent a "medical expert/advisor" to Hong Kong about the time you noted a change in the way Hong Kong was reporting numbers. It is quite possible that Hong Kong was ordered to make their numbers look better.
It should also be noted that Hong Kong had reached the practical limit of their medical system by mid April (duly noted on FR, by the way). They changed their treatment protocol at the same time. Deaths immediately went up, but so did the number of people released. This had the apparent effect of lowering the number of reported SARS victims in the hospital.
Your excellent observation about the change in the way they were classifying patients, combined with a change in treatment that may have been designed to free up beds even if it meant more people would die, may be quite significant.
I continue to hope that the Hong Kong numbers do, in fact, mean what they seem on the surface to mean: Hong Kong is gradually getting SARS under control.
However, if they have messed with their reporting enough, then we may be seeing nothing more than a change in strategy. In that event, the reported numbers do not tell us anything meaningful.
I suspect that they have decided that they can manage a certain number of cases in the hospital system, and that whether or not an early stage victim is immediately hospitalized is decided partly on the basis of bed availability. The good sign here seems to be that the hospitals are now taking more of the early stage patients in, which would indicate a waning of the epidemic.
On another note, have you noticed how closely the China death figures correspond to the Hong Kong death figures? By coincidence, they are issued immediately after the HK figures each day, but unlike the HK figures, give no specifics on who died. Kinda like snatching a number out of thin air.
I hadn't noticed. However, that is no surprise since I rely on YOU for info like that. :-)
Keep up the great work!
BTW: We all know the China numbers are not reliable. But IF they were, they would be looking suspiciously like exponential growth has begun.
BTW2: It is interesting to see the latest set of restrictions the Chicoms have implemented in Beijing. The list of closures included internet cafes. Yesterday they were arresting people posting SARS "rumors" on the internet, too.
A month?! You don't know
your tin foil types very well!
Conspiracy types
put chemtrails and SARS
together almost a month
ago. Here's one link:
"From "World Action": 'Chemtrails' and SARS
So-called 'SARS' could be the symptoms which are afflicting many millions of people now from the massive worldwide spraying of 'Chemtrails'. The effects of Chemtrails have been covered over for ten years. And covered over probably with great difficulty over the past two to three years, because symptoms from the chemtrailing are becoming increasingly severe. Our behind-the-scenes controllers may have felt the start of the attack on the Iraq was a good time to publicise another life-threatening situation as a diversion to the rape of Iraq. You can see in the article below, which I posted at APFN noticeboard on Saturday, that a friend in northern England had to go to the casualty department at his local hospital because he had severe symptoms which he believes are definitely caused by the intense chemtrail spraying. He could barely breathe, and felt very ill. He was astonished to find the casualty department was packed with people who had the same symptoms. I believe our covert controllers do have nasty viruses and are willing to release them here and there, but what has suddenly been termed 'SARS' may be what millions have been suffering (and dying from) for quite a few years due to the massive, poisonous/toxic 'Chemtrail' spraying. What is sprayed in the chemtrails may vary from region to region, and may vary/be changed at different times. Open discussion by a lot of people, exchanging information and ideas, should sort out what 'SARS' is actually all about. Whatever the covert rulers are doing to us, we should take every opportunity to turn their ploys against them. 'The People' are waking up. Michael http://www.world-action.co.uk/chemtrails.html
SARS? Or is it CARF? Sat Apr 5 05:26:40 2003 80.189.16.205 "
The good news is that their hospitalization strategy is now admitting cases at an early stage of sickness. That shows a relaxation of the stresses on the system. I think you are justified in feeling better over the numbers from HK.
Whether China is capable of tracking the number of new rural cases is in serious doubt, even if they wanted to report them accurately.
Since China permitted the exportation of SARS from Beijing, the numbers of victims all along the rail lines over the next few weeks probably will be exponential.
As of Friday, news reports said almost 1 million people had left Beijing. (Beijing has/had 12 million.)
What will the other 11 million people think about this, and what will they do? (I haven't seen any updates.)
Whether China is capable of tracking the number of new rural cases is in serious doubt, even if they wanted to report them accurately.
Travel by foreigners to rural areas was banned over a week ago, and foreigners already there are being encouraged unofficially to leave. This will reduce the flow of news from these regions to the outside world.
I seriously doubt the Chicom government knows the real situation even now. But whatever it is, they will not want the outside world to know if the news gets worse.
It's entirely possible that Hong Kong and Beijing will get their outbreaks pretty much under control like Toronto has, and the world will breathe a sigh of relief, and move onto the next thing the media puts into the spotlight.
But, we won't know whether that's justified.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.