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June 25, 2003

INTERNATIONAL IMMUNIZATION NEWS

“Four Months of Clues to Diagnosis: SARS”

Washington Post (www.washingtonpost.com) (06/23/03) P. A3; Connolly, Ceci

World Health Organization (WHO) epidemiologists were slow to warn about the danger and contagious spread of severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS) in Asia, but they were thwarted by the Chinese government, which sought to cover up the illness in the hopes that its image would not be tarnished from the outside--until it was too late for WHO to block the disease from moving to other nations.  However, the international agency will be helped by all of the information now available about the disease’s spread and clues about how to spot infectious diseases before they are fully

understood: reviewing anecdotal evidence from local observers and watching sales of preventive items such as surgical masks or homeopathic remedies could lead to a quicker warning to governments and individuals of disease outbreaks or bioterrorism.  The international community faces a greater challenge than ever as air travel has become ubiquitous, providing the opportunity for diseases such as SARS to jump from one region of the world to another--for example, from southeast Asia to Toronto--and becoming much harder to contain and combat.