Regards, Ivan
Posted on 05/09/2003 2:57:45 PM PDT by MadIvan
RUSSIA closed border crossings with China yesterday and imposed a ban on commercial flights to China, Hong Kong and Taiwan after doctors reported the country’s first case of Sars.
The emergency measures were announced as the worldwide death toll from severe acute respiratory syndrome rose above 500, with more than 7,300 infections reported in 30 countries. Yesterday’s casualties include four in Hong Kong and the first in Shanghai.
Russia’s efforts to halt the virus’s spread from China, where 224 people have died, will force the closure of crossings lacking adequate diagnostic facilities on the 2,200-mile border between the countries.
“It is our duty to protect the population from this threat, for which a set of additional measures is necessary,” Mikhail Kasyanov, Russia’s Prime Minister, said. Mr Kasyanov said that visitors arriving from all high-risk countries should expect to be examined at ports of entry.
Moscow, where the authorities have begun spraying the Metro with anti-viral agents, is home to more than 10 million people including hundreds of thousands from parts of Russia and the former Soviet republics bordering China.
A 25-year-old man in hospital near the Chinese border, who was given a Sars diagnosis, joins more than two dozen others in Russia now in quarantine, suspected of having the virus. The patient was originally told that he had pneumonia, but further tests were conducted after it emerged that he had been staying in a hotel frequented by Chinese citizens.
The misdiagnosis has raised concerns that Russia’s dilapidated healthcare system may be unable to cope with the rapid spread of a virus which has vexed authorities the world over. Since pneumonia is more common in Russia than in the West, there are fears that Russia may have underestimated the extent of the disease’s advance on its territory.
Regards, Ivan
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