Quarantine clamp on killer virus
The Age April 2 2003 By David Wroe, Amanda Dunn
A mother and her son wear masks on the street to protect against a deadly pneumonia virus in Hong Kong. Photo: AFP
Related links: Avoid travel to Hong Kong: WHO Australians warned as toll mounts More killer bugs to come: expert All the facts: SARS In-depth
Airline pilots entering Australia will have to declare sick passengers under a quarantine clampdown as the killer SARS virus spreads panic around the world.
As the death toll reached 62 and Australia's first confirmed case of the disease emerged, Commonwealth Chief Medical Officer Richard Smallwood announced the tough quarantine rules.
"We'll be making... pilots check with quarantine and get quarantine clearances," Professor Smallwood said.
"If someone is sick and arriving in Sydney, we do not turn them away. We care for them. (But) they would be isolated."
He said Australians should consider deferring non-essential travel to any of the 15 affected countries - Singapore, Hong Kong, Vietnam, China, Germany, Switzerland, Canada, Italy, Ireland, Romania, Thailand, Britain, the United States, Taiwan and France.
But suspending all travel to the worst affected countries would be "an over-reaction".
Under World Health Organisation advice, travellers who show symptoms while in an affected country may not be able to leave that country until they are well.
Authorities notified WHO on Monday of a British tourist who showed symptoms when he arrived in Australia in February after spending two days in Singapore. The man recovered and health authorities are satisfied he did not infect anyone in this country. He has since returned to Britain.
The NSW Health Department traced everyone the man had contacted, Professor Smallwood said. Given the incubation time of a week, anyone infected by the man would have shown symptoms by now, he said.
Doctors did not realise at the time that the man had SARS because it was a month before WHO issued its alert.
Professor Smallwood said three Australians were now being monitored for the illness - two in NSW and one in Canberra. In the past fortnight, there have been about 40 suspected cases. All have been given the all-clear.
A professor of virology at Melbourne University, Ian Gust, said the most likely way in which SARS was spread was through droplets transmitted through coughing or sneezing.
Deputy Chief Medical Officer John Mathews, said a few cases could not be explained by close contact.
Once it has infected the upper respiratory tract, the virus could move into the lungs and cause pneumonia. The body then sends white blood cells to combat the invader, while the lungs fill with liquid.
Professor Gust said that in cases where the patient died from the disease, the lungs became heavy and could not function on their own.
A spokesman for the Victorian Department of Human Services said major hospitals were prepared to deal with suspected or confirmed cases of the disease. Medical staff treating the person would wear full protective clothing, masks and gloves.
While several people have been investigated for SARS in Victoria, there have been no confirmed cases.
Meanwhile, a 14-year-old schoolboy sparked a wild rush on supermarkets in pneumonia-wary Hong Kong with a bogus news report that the port city had been declared an "infected area", police said today.
The message, which was posted on a website yesterday, said Hong Kong would be closed to the rest of the world due to the Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome (SARS) outbreak gripping the territory.
The false report came as the Hong Kong government was preparing to move some 200 residents of a quarantined housing estate to two holiday camps in an effort to stop the spread of SARS, which has so far claimed 16 lives and infected nearly 700 people in Hong Kong.
The panic buying only abated after the Hong Kong government dismissed the information, but not before fears of a Hong Kong-wide closure affected financial markets, with the Hang Seng index plunging about 100 points.
The student was arrested in his Tai Po home late yesterday on suspicion "of access to computer with dishonest intent," a police spokesman said.
He was released on bail of $HK1,000 ($A210), but must report back to police in three months, the spokesman said.
The unnamed student allegedly stole a page design from the website of the Chinese-language Ming Pao newspaper, copied it on his own web page and added a bogus news item that Hong Kong had been declared an "infected area," border checkpoints had been closed and people had been ordered to stay home. The report coincided with April Fool's Day.
- Agencies
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