Posted on 04/29/2003 11:55:48 AM PDT by Clive
The World Health Organization lifted its travel advisory against Toronto Tuesday after a week of anger by Toronto politicians and lobbying efforts by Canadian health officials.
Lifting the advisory comes with several conditions, Dr. Gro Harlem Brundtland, director- general of the WHO, said at a news conference in Geneva on Tuesday. The removal comes after Ontario Health Minister Tony Clement led a delegation of federal and provincial health- care experts to Geneva on Tuesday to provide documentation the warning was unnecessary.
“We will be lifting the travel advice for Toronto, Canada, effective tomorrow [Wednesday],” Dr. Brundtland said.
Factors included in the consideration included a drop in the number of probable SARS cases, a total of 20 days since the last case of community transmission and no new confirmed cases exported from Toronto, she said. The 20-day mark is key to getting the travel advisory — in place since last Wednesday — lifted. The WHO wants to see two periods of the disease’s 10- day incubation period to pass before it believes an affected area is safe to visit.
Dr. Brundtland also explained the conditions.
“I need to remind you that Toronto still has an outbreak of SARS, and the lifting of this travel advice does not change the reality that Toronto has a status as an affected area,” Dr. Brundtland said.
She said she has discussed with Prime Minister Jean Chrétien measures to implement stricter screening procedures at airports including interviewing passengers. Currently, passengers are provided with information on cherry- coloured cards.
Dr. Brundtland said considerations taken by the world body when reviewing travel advisories on several countries Tuesday included the number of SARS cases in an area, the last dates of cases where community transmission occurred, and the last date of exported cases.
Based on those criteria, Hong Kong, Beijing and the Chinese provinces of Guangdong and Shanxi province in China will remain under travel advisories, she said.
Ontario Premier Ernie Eves had earlier predicted the announcement, suggesting during a scrum in Toronto that a conditional lifting of the advisory was a possibility.
He said he thought the WHO was concerned about Canada’s screening efforts for severe acute respiratory syndrome at its airports.
“They could, I guess, have a conditional lift, I suppose, if we put screening in airports across the country,” Mr. Eves said. Sources in his office leaked news of the announcement about 30 minutes before it was made.
The news is likely to cause jubilation in the Ontario and federal governments. The advisory has cost Toronto billions of dollars in lost revenue.
At a press conference in Geneva following the announcement, Mr. Clement said that part of the reason that the advisory was lifted because of successful containment of the disease within the health community. Besides transmission to health-care workers, there has not been a spread of severe acute respiratory syndrome in the community in 20 days, since April 9, double the incubation period for the disease.
He encouraged people to come back to Toronto. “Our doors are open,” Mr. Clement said in Geneva.
Earlier, Mr. Clement and Colin D’Cunha, Ontario’s chief medical officer of health, were tight-lipped over whether they thought that the WHO would change its mind. They would say only that they did their best to present information to persuade the WHO that severe acute respiratory syndrome is on the decline in Canada and very much contained to hospital settings.
Dr. D’Cunha said that in their presentation, the Canadian delegates assured the WHO that the number of cases has dropped dramatically and that cases are not being transmitted within the general community. As of Monday, the province had only 39 active probable SARS cases and 498 people in quarantine.
On Wednesday, a group of WHO officials are expected to arrive in Toronto on Wednesday to see first-hand what is being done in the city to contain the disease, including Dr. David Heymann, the organization’s head of communicable diseases.
Meanwhile, hospitals in Toronto have begun to return to normal as the worst of the disease’s spread appears to be over.
For the first time in weeks, hospital workers at Mount Sinai Hospital were allowed to take off facemasks in parts of the hospital where they are not around patients. And at Toronto’s Sunnybrook and Women’s hospital, a quarantine order was removed. The facility’s SARS, critical care and cardiovascular surgical units were reopened.
Seems reasonable... as long as Toronto hasn't hid the any new cases. The outburst of political anger, doesn't give me comfort that they wouldn't resort to that.
Right, because they couldn't possibly have the virus contained. Any news that does not fit a TEOTWAWKI scenario must be either discounted or trumpeted as proof of a conspiracy.
Yeah, me too. No reason to travel to or vaction in Canada this year. We all know they think we are "American bastards" who they are all "morally superior" to.
Do you believe that the CDC (who had responded to the call from Toronto when the WHO sat in Geneva) would conspire with Toronto to cover up this disease.
In fact, one of the problems is that doctors in Toronto were reporting "suspected" cases when the WHO standard for reporting was "probable" so the numbers were exaggerated in the minds of the people in Geneva.
Also, the outbreak was already past before the advisary went on and never got beyond the first vector, was confined to hospital transmission and never got loose in the community.
This was an outbreak. It was serious. It caused deaths. It never became an epidemic in Toronto.
For those who didn't see it, here is Shelia's comment"
"In a mind-boggling statement uttered last week, Copps asserted that Americans are "hungry for role models" and that they have no choice but to resort to Hollywood to find their heroes. With great self-satisfaction, Copps boasted, "When we created Canada, we didn't need a revolution — we had an evolution." "
The arrogance of these socialist Canadians blows my mind. Canada cannot survive without us. Period. It's time we make that point. All we need to do to get their attention is to stop traveling to or vacationing in Canada.
hawk
Yeah, unfortunately, we don't have a comparative beautifully scenic area like East Hastings in Vancouver. Maybe if we could fly some of your thousands of street heroin junkies out here, we might be able to attract some tourists. Vancouver is a socialist whole in the ground.
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