The front line warriors in the pending war against the next global epidemic will carry stethoscopes and wear lab coats, and in the case of Dr. Thomas Tsang, spectacles.
And it is likely Hong Kong will be the battleground.

The mild-mannered Tsang is considered one of the world's foremost experts in fighting the devastating Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome (SARS) virus that killed 299 people in Hong Kong and spread to Toronto in 2003.

Tsang has a huge responsibility on his hands. He is the key doctor in the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region charged with ensuring the next viral outbreak, in whatever form or mutation, doesn't happen.

And if Canadians are to prevent the next tragedy, they would be wise to see what lessons have been learned in trying to stop one of the world's most deadly diseases.

"You never know what's going to happen tomorrow," Tsang said in an interview in his boardroom, which was the initial nerve centre to create a SARS response strategy during the 2003 crisis.
"You have to have a plan ready," he said. "It's not just sufficient to have a plan, you must execute it."
The normally bustling cosmopolitan financial gateway to Asia was at a standstill in 2003. Business and tourism were hardest hit by SARS which infected 1,755 residents and killed 299 from March 11 to June 6 that year.

Health-care workers and officials fought day in and day out to stop the spread of SARS.
Similar scenarios were carried out in Toronto and elsewhere in Canada where 438 people were infected, and 44 died of SARS from Feb. 23 to June 7, 2003.
SARS has been a wakeup call for health-care workers in Toronto.

Dr. Allison McGeer, director of Infection Control at Mount Sinai, said Canadians have learned from the crisis.
"There's been a number of changes in hospitals, such as guidelines for infection control, educating staff in dealing with infectious diseases, strengthening links between public health departments and hospitals, and working together more smoothly," McGeer said.

McGeer says we always have to ask ourselves: "What more can be done?"

Read the full story here

Surgical masks insufficient protection during flu pandemic

In a report released yesterday, a panel of experts said that surgical masks aren't adequate to protect people from becoming infected during an influenza pandemic,

The report, written for the Public Health Agency of Canada, suggested industrial respirators known as N95s, would be needed to minimize the risk of transmission of flu.

"Surgical masks don't really fit the bill," said Dr. Donald Low, chair of the panel which brought together infection control specialists, nurses and occupational health and safety experts.

"Even if they have a good filtering capacity, inhalable virus particles will take the route of least resistance, which will be around the mask and through the gap that exists between the surgical mask and the face, just because they're not affected by gravity"

The panel was asked to advise the public health agency on one of the most contentious issues in influenza science - how flu spreads.

The answer will be used to craft guidance for provinces and territories on what protective equipment they should consider stockpiling for health care workers in a pandemic as well as advice for the public on how to reduce the risk of getting sick in such an event.

Read the rest of the article from the Canadian Press here

Deathly virus starts like an innocent cold

By Guy Derla

Last Tuesday, my eye fell on an article in the Washington Post who reported that an apparently common cold virus (adenovirus) has mutated into a killer strain quite unexpectedly.

In the State Oregon in the U.S. it recently caused a death rate as high as 23%!

The American government run Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the CDC, has been tracking the virus over the past year and has recorded outbreaks in Oregon, Texas, Washington State and New York.
The virus, first discovered in 1955 in The Netherlands as the adenovirus 14, has recently mutated into a more severe virulent form.

The Frightening thing about this virus is that it's so strong that it can kill strong, young and otherwise healthy people, rather than the usual "at risk" populations of the very young and the very old. There's no way to know if this virus will spark an epidemic, or whether it will die down and disappear for momentarily.

Those who have survived the virus, say that it came on like a usual cold.
But then, instead of getting better at the usual 4-7 day point, their symptoms got worse and turned into high fevers, coughs, and difficult breathing.
Some people have even required mechanical ventilation in Intensive Care to help them breathe.

Could this be, like the in my earlier post mentioned acinetobacter baumannii, next avian flu (bird flu) or SARS -like outbreak and turn into a real pandemic? Will it come our way?

It makes you think when you have a stuffy nose next time!

Source: RevolutionHealth