Replies

http://www.cdc.gov/od/oc/media/transcripts/t030321.htm

DR. GERBERDING: Thank you again for joining us for this update. The CDC MMWR came out today with a good summary of what's going on in the progress of the investigation, but I did want to update you on a few specific points.

First of all, to date WHO is reporting 337 cases of SARS from 14 countries. That is including 10 people who have died from the illness internationally, and in the United States we are aware of 22 reports of SARS that are under investigation in a total of 12 states. We have not had deaths in the United States to this point in time.

Two notable aspects of the investigations ongoing in the United States, first of all, we have identified situations where a case in a traveler may have involved transmission to others in the United States. So first of all, in one cluster, an individual who traveled to Asia may have been the source of infection in two health care workers who provided care, and in the second situation, one person who traveled to Asia may have been the source of infection in a family member. Again I'll stress these are undergoing active investigation, and so we can't confirm that this is the situation, but we wanted to alert you to the fact that spread to contacts of travelers with this illness may be occurring in the United States.

In addition, we're aware that two Americans stayed in the hotel in Kowloon, Hong Kong, that's been implicated as the initial source of most of the spread of this disease. The two Americans were staying on the ninth floor of the hotel, which is the place where almost all of the international cases appeared to have been exposed initially during sometime in February. Those two Americans are here and are included in the 22 cases that I mentioned earlier, and we are continuing to investigate the situation in Hong Kong.

The Hong Kong Health Department is doing a very thorough job of evaluating who was in the hotel and where they are now, and the investigation will evaluate potential modes of spread in that environment. And we look forward to their updates as we go forward.