It’s possible that I shall make an ass of myself. But in that case one can always get out of it with a little dialectic. I have, of course, so worded my proposition as to be right either way (K.Marx, Letter to F.Engels on the Indian Mutiny)
US President Donald Trump has announced a 30-day travel ban on most foreign nationals who have been in 26 European countries in the last 14 days. The ban does not include US citizens.
YOU NEED TO KNOW THAT TRUMP IS BLAMING EUROPE FOR THE CORONAVIRUS
NO LONGER WILL THE GOP REFER TO IT AS THE WUTAN CORONAVIRUS BUT THE MILAN CORONAVIRUS
THE SUBTEXT IS THAT EUROPE BEING INVADED BY MIGRANT REFUGEES BRING DISEASE AND THEY SHIP IT TO PURE WASP AMERICA
AGAIN A STEPHEN MILLER PLOY TO UNDERMINE LEGAL IMMIGRATION!!!
Sunday, January 19, 2020
Experts warn over scale of China virus as US airports start screening
JANUARY 18, 2020The outbreak centred around a seafood market in the central city of Wuhan
The true scale of the outbreak of a mysterious SARS-like virus in China is likely far bigger than officially reported, scientists have warned, as countries ramp up measures to prevent the disease from spreading.
Fears that the virus will spread are growing ahead of the Lunar New Year holiday, when hundreds of millions of Chinese move around the country and many others host or visit extended family members living overseas.
Authorities in China say two people have died and at least 45 have been infected, with the outbreak centred around a seafood market in the central city of Wuhan, a city of 11 million inhabitants that serves as a major transport hub.
But a paper published Friday by scientists with the MRC Centre for Global Infectious Disease Analysis at Imperial College in London said the number of cases in the city was likely closer to 1,700.
The researchers said their estimate was largely based on the fact that cases had been reported overseas –- two in Thailand and one in Japan.
The virus—a new strain of coronavirus that humans can contract—has caused alarm because of its connection to SARS (Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome), which killed nearly 650 people across mainland China and Hong Kong in 2002-2003.
China has not announced any travel restrictions, but authorities in Hong Kong have already stepped up detection measures, including rigorous temperature checkpoints for inbound travellers from the Chinese mainland.
The US said from Friday it would begin screening flights arriving from Wuhan at San Francisco airport and New York's JFK—which both receive direct flights—as well as Los Angeles, where many flights connect.
And Thailand said it was already screening passengers arriving in Bangkok, Chiang Mai and Phuket and would soon introduce similar controls in the beach resort of Krabi.
Two deaths
No human-to-human transmission has been confirmed so far, but Wuhan's health commission has said the possibility "cannot be excluded".
A World Health Organization doctor said it would not be surprising if there was "some limited human-to-human transmission, especially among families who have close contact with one another".
Scientists with the MRC Centre for Global Infectious Disease Analysis—which advises bodies including the World Health Organization—said they estimated a "total of 1,723" people in Wuhan would have been infected as of January 12.
"For Wuhan to have exported three cases to other countries would imply there would have to be many more cases than have been reported," Professor Neil Ferguson, one of the authors of the report, told the BBC.
"I am substantially more concerned than I was a week ago," he said, while adding that it was "too early to be alarmist".
"People should be considering the possibility of substantial human-to-human transmission more seriously than they have so far," he continued, saying it was "unlikely" that animal exposure was the sole source of infection.
Local authorities in Wuhan said a 69-year-old man died on Wednesday, becoming the second fatal case, with the disease causing pulmonary tuberculosis and damage to multiple organ functions.
After the death was reported, online discussion spread in China over the severity of the Wuhan coronavirus—and how much information the government may be hiding from the public.
Several complained about censorship of online posts, while others made comparisons to 2003, when Beijing drew criticism from the WHO for underreporting the number of SARS cases.
"It's so strange," wrote a web user on the social media platform Weibo, citing the overseas cases in Japan and Thailand. "They all have Wuhan pneumonia cases but (in China) we don't have any infections outside of Wuhan—is that scientific?"
JANUARY 17, 2020
Thais find second case linked to China mystery virus
Thailand detected its second case of a mysterious SARS-linked virus in a visitor from China, health officials said Friday, as authorities ramp up airport screenings ahead of an expected surge in arrivals for Chinese New Year.
The 74-year-old Chinese woman is being treated at hospital after presenting with symptoms at Thailand's biggest airport Suvarnabhumi on January 13, according to the health ministry.
She was diagnosed with pneumonia linked to the new coronavirus, which has stirred alarm after killing two in China and hospitalising dozens. It has also been detected in Japan.
"People don't have to panic as there is no spread of the virus in Thailand," the ministry said in its statement.
The woman, whose condition is improving, arrived from the central Chinese city of Wuhan—believed to be at the epicentre of the outbreak.
It came after Thai doctors diagnosed another Chinese traveller with mild pneumonia on January 8, later confirmed to have been caused by the new virus.
The World Health Organisation has said "much remains to be understood" about the coronavirus from the same family as SARS (Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome), which claimed hundreds of lives more than a decade ago.
During the upcoming holiday period, more than 1,300 passengers are expected to arrive in Thailand daily from Wuhan alone.
SARS LIKE PANDEMIC IN CHINA The virus -- a new strain of coronavirus that humans can contract -- has caused alarm because of its connection to SARS (Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome), which killed nearly 650 people across mainland China and Hong Kong in 2002-2003.
Experts warn over scale of China virus as US airports start screening
The outbreak centred around a seafood market in the central city of Wuhan (AFP Photo/Noel Celis)More
Hong Kong (AFP) - The true scale of the outbreak of a mysterious SARS-like virus in China is likely far bigger than officially reported, scientists have warned, as countries ramp up measures to prevent the disease from spreading.
Fears that the virus will spread are growing ahead of the Lunar New Year holiday, when hundreds of millions of Chinese move around the country and many others host or visit extended family members living overseas.
Authorities in China say two people have died and at least 45 have been infected, with the outbreak centred around a seafood market in the central city of Wuhan, a city of 11 million inhabitants that serves as a major transport hub.
But a paper published Friday by scientists with the MRC Centre for Global Infectious Disease Analysis at Imperial College in London said the number of cases in the city was likely closer to 1,700.
The researchers said their estimate was largely based on the fact that cases had been reported overseas –- two in Thailand and one in Japan.
The virus -- a new strain of coronavirus that humans can contract -- has caused alarm because of its connection to SARS (Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome), which killed nearly 650 people across mainland China and Hong Kong in 2002-2003.
China has not announced any travel restrictions, but authorities in Hong Kong have already stepped up detection measures, including rigorous temperature checkpoints for inbound travellers from the Chinese mainland.
The US said from Friday it would begin screening flights arriving from Wuhan at San Francisco airport and New York's JFK -- which both receive direct flights -- as well as Los Angeles, where many flights connect.
And Thailand said it was already screening passengers arriving in Bangkok, Chiang Mai and Phuket and would soon introduce similar controls in the beach resort of Krabi.
- Two deaths -
No human-to-human transmission has been confirmed so far, but Wuhan's health commission has said the possibility "cannot be excluded".
A World Health Organization doctor said it would not be surprising if there was "some limited human-to-human transmission, especially among families who have close contact with one another".
Scientists with the MRC Centre for Global Infectious Disease Analysis -- which advises bodies including the World Health Organization -- said they estimated a "total of 1,723" people in Wuhan would have been infected as of January 12.
"For Wuhan to have exported three cases to other countries would imply there would have to be many more cases than have been reported," Professor Neil Ferguson, one of the authors of the report, told the BBC.
"I am substantially more concerned than I was a week ago," he said, while adding that it was "too early to be alarmist".
"People should be considering the possibility of substantial human-to-human transmission more seriously than they have so far," he continued, saying it was "unlikely" that animal exposure was the sole source of infection.
Local authorities in Wuhan said a 69-year-old man died on Wednesday, becoming the second fatal case, with the disease causing pulmonary tuberculosis and damage to multiple organ functions.
After the death was reported, online discussion spread in China over the severity of the Wuhan coronavirus -- and how much information the government may be hiding from the public.
Several complained about censorship of online posts, while others made comparisons to 2003, when Beijing drew criticism from the WHO for underreporting the number of SARS cases.
"It's so strange," wrote a web user on the social media platform Weibo, citing the overseas cases in Japan and Thailand. "They all have Wuhan pneumonia cases but (in China) we don't have any infections outside of Wuhan -- is that scientific?"
China believes new virus behind mystery pneumonia outbreak
By Agence France-Presse on January 16, 2020 China believes a mysterious pneumonia outbreak that struck 59 people is caused by a new strain of virus from the same family as SARS, which killed hundreds of people more than a decade ago.
Lead scientist Xu Jianguo told the official Xinhua news agency that experts had “preliminarily determined” a new type of coronavirus was behind the outbreak, first confirmed on December 31 in Wuhan, a central Chinese city with a population of more than 11 million.
It initially sparked fears of a resurgence of highly contagious Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome, and prompted authorities in Hong Kong — badly hit by SARS in 2002-2003 — to take precautions, including stepping up the disinfection of trains and airplanes, and checks of passengers.
China has since ruled out a fresh outbreak of SARS, which killed 349 people in mainland China and another 299 in Hong Kong.
“A total of 15 positive results of the new type of coronavirus had been detected” in the lab, through tests on infected blood samples and throat swabs, Xu said.
The World Health Organization (WHO) confirmed the preliminary discovery of a new coronavirus in a statement.
“Further investigations are also required to determine the source, modes of transmission, extent of infection and countermeasures implemented,” said Gauden Galea, the WHO Representative to China.
Wuhan’s health commission said on Sunday seven of the 59 patients were seriously ill, but none had died. All received treatment in quarantine.
Eight patients have recovered and were discharged from hospital on Wednesday, according to Xinhua.
The commission said the infection broke out between December 12 and 29, with some of the patients employed at a city seafood market since closed for disinfection.
No obvious evidence of human-to-human transmission has been reported so far.
Footage from January 1 by state broadcaster CCTV showed an official notice at the market saying it had been closed in light of the “current pneumonia situation in our city”, without providing a date for reopening.
The outbreak comes just a few weeks before China’s busiest annual travel period, when millions of people take buses, trains and planes for Lunar New Year.
A Chinese transport ministry official said at a briefing that arrangements were made for “disinfection, monitoring and prevention” focusing on areas with large numbers of passengers, including stations and cargo hubs.
Civil aviation and national railway authorities said they had not received any reports of affected patients taking flights or trains, and that they were closely watching the situation.
Wan Xiangdong, chief flight officer of China’s Civil Aviation Administration, said all planes were equipped with emergency medical kits.
WHO representative Galea said “people with symptoms of pneumonia and reported travel history to Wuhan have been identified at international airports”.
The organisation has not recommended any travel restrictions on China.
– Hong Kong, Taiwan fears –
In Hong Kong, hospitals have raised their alert level to “serious” and stepped up detection measures — including temperature checkpoints for inbound travellers.
Authorities in the financial hub say 48 people have been hospitalised in recent days after returning from Wuhan and displaying flu-like illnesses, but none were confirmed to have contracted the mystery virus.
Twenty-five of the patients have been discharged, Hong Kong authorities said Thursday.
City residents worried about the outbreak have rushed to buy face masks from local pharmacies, with many selling out earlier this week.
Inbound trains and flights from the mainland are undergoing extra cleaning and disinfection, authorities said.
Additional thermal imaging systems have been set up at the city’s airport, while inbound high-speed rail passengers from the mainland face checks by hand-held infrared thermometers.
The coming holiday has prompted concerns in Taiwan, where top officials urged the island’s health and welfare ministry to strengthen quarantine controls at airports.
On Monday, the country’s centre for disease control also advised residents planning to travel to or near Wuhan to wear masks and avoid contact with wild animals.
The US embassy in China warned on Tuesday that Americans travelling in the country should avoid animals and contact with sick people.
The number of people infected with a mysterious viral pneumonia in Wuhan has climbed to 59, with the first patient exhibiting symptoms as early as Dec. 12, the city’s health commission announced Sunday. Though the virus has not yet been identified, several causes — including SARS, as many in the country feared — have been ruled out.
Seven of the infected individuals are in critical condition, down from 11 in the commission’s previous statement Friday. No deaths from the pneumonia have been reported.
In addition to severe acute respiratory syndrome — a disease that killed over 700 people in Hong Kong, Taiwan, and the Chinese mainland in 2002-2003 — several other viruses including bird flu, regular flu, and Middle East respiratory syndrome (MERS) have also been eliminated as potential causes.
Wuhan authorities first acknowledged over two dozen cases of the unexplained illness on Dec. 31. As of Sunday, 16 people had been hospitalized with pneumonia in Hong Kong after returning from Wuhan, according to the special administrative region’s Centre for Health Protection. The day before, Singapore’s health ministry said that a 3-year-old who had returned to the city-state after traveling to Wuhan had contracted respiratory syncytial virus, a common cause of childhood pneumonia, and was quarantined but in stable condition.
Meanwhile, China’s health officials and state-run media outlets have said little about the possibility of infections spreading to other cities on the mainland.
However, according to Ma Jin, director of the School of Public Health at Shanghai Jiao Tong University, this should be seen as an encouraging sign. “China’s epidemic prevention system works like this: Once a hospital receives a suspected case, it will report to the health commissions immediately — so if there are any more infections in other cities, the public should know about it,” Ma told Sixth Tone.
The Wuhan Health Commission’s most recent statement includes a seven-point action plan for dealing with the outbreak. It says that 163 people who came into close contact with the infected individuals had been put under medical observation, and that the South China Seafood Wholesale Market — where the first infections are believed to have occurred — had been shut down for “further hygiene investigations.” The health authority added that it is still trying to identify the pathogen and determine the exact origin of the infections.
Amid online backlash over the Wuhan government’s initial response to the infection, which some felt was slow and inadequate, local police announced the next day that eight people from the city had been taken into custody for “spreading rumors” about the disease that many online feared might be SARS.
In a statement Monday, the World Health Organization said Wuhan authorities had been providing information about the outbreak to the WHO’s China office since Dec. 31. “The symptoms reported among the patients are common to several respiratory diseases, and pneumonia is common in the winter season,” the WHO said. “However, the occurrence of 44 cases of pneumonia requiring hospitalization clustered in space and time should be handled prudently.”
The WHO suggested that there could be an “exposure link to animals,” given that several of the initial infections occurred in vendors at the seafood market, which also sells poultry and meat. Michael Osterholm, director of the Center for Infectious Diseases Research and Policy in Minnesota, told the U.S. health news website Stat that the virus likely comes from birds or animals and not seafood.
With the first day of the Spring Festival holiday — during which around 400 million Chinese people travel to their hometowns to be with family — just weeks away, there is some concern that the pneumonia cluster in Wuhan may become a national rather than a local problem. But Director Ma says it’s possible to improve one’s chances of staying safe, too.
“Spring Festival will increase the possibility of infection for sure,” he said. “However, there are ways for people to prevent it — for example, by washing hands often and avoiding sharing food with others.”
Health officials in the city of Wuhan in Hubei province, China are reporting (computer translated) a total of 59 patients with unexplained diagnosis of viral pneumonia have been reported as of Jan.5, including 7 critically ill patients.
Image/WHO Twitter
No fatal cases have been recorded. All patients are receiving treatment in isolation. 163 close contacts are under medical surveillance.
Among the 59 patients, the earliest onset of the cases was December 12, 2019, and the latest onset was December 29.
An epidemiological survey showed that some patients were operating households in Wuhan South China Seafood City (South China Seafood Wholesale Market). As of now, preliminary investigations have shown no clear evidence of human-to-human transmission and no medical staff infections. Respiratory pathogens such as influenza, avian influenza, adenovirus, infectious atypical pneumonia ( SARS) and the Middle East Respiratory Syndrome (MERS) have been excluded . Pathogen identification and cause tracing are still underway.
According to a World Health Organization (WHO) risk assessment today, there is limited information to determine the overall risk of this reported cluster of pneumonia of unknown etiology. The reported link to a wholesale fish and live animal market could indicate an exposure link to animals.
At present, with the support of the state and Hubei Province, Wuhan has adopted the following main prevention and control measures:
First, it is to treat patients with all its strength.
The second is to carry out isolation treatment for all cases.
The third is to continue to conduct relevant case searches and retrospective investigations in medical institutions throughout the city.
The fourth is to carry out close contact tracking seriously, implement medical observation on the close contacts that have been tracked according to regulations, and have not found any abnormal symptoms such as fever.
Fifth, we will take measures to suspend the market for South China Seafood City, and carry out environmental sanitation and further hygiene investigations.
Sixth, actively carry out epidemiological investigations.
Seventh, cooperate with the state and province to carry out pathogen identification (including nucleic acid detection and virus isolation and cultivation) and trace the cause of the cause, and prevention and control work is proceeding in an orderly manner.
The unidentified viral illness that has sickened dozens in the Chinese city of Wuhan is not severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS), according to local health officials.
In the early 2000s, an outbreak of SARS swept the globe, infecting more than 8,000 people and killing more than 750, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. The epidemic began in China and hit the country harder than any other, so when an unknown form of pneumonia recently emerged in Wuhan, it stirred rumors of a second SARS outbreak. Now, local health officials have officially crossed SARS off the list of potential culprits, according to The New York Times.
Officials also confirmed that the mystery illness is not Middle East Respiratory Syndrome (MERS), bird flu or an adenovirus.
As of Sunday (Jan. 5), 59 people in Wuhan have been diagnosed with the unidentified disease, presenting with symptoms of fever, body aches, breathing difficulties and lung injury. The total number of infected people is up from the 44 cases reported last week.
In addition, 21 people who recently visited the city were hospitalized in Hong Kong between Dec. 31 and Jan. 6, according to a report from the Hong Kong health department. The city will also ramp up efforts to spot feverish passengers traveling through its international airport and on its high-speed rail system, according to the report. Health authorities in Singapore are also on the alert for infected travelers and recently quarantined a young girl after her trip to Wuhan. She was later diagnosed with a common viral illness, according to the Singapore Ministry of Health.
Rumors of a potential SARS outbreak gained traction online earlier this month, but Chinese authorities have since censored the hashtag #WuhanSARS and are now investigating eight people in Wuhan who allegedly spread misleading information about the outbreak on social media, The New York Times reported. The government failed to adequately inform the public and international health agencies during the historic SARS epidemic, which may explain the reaction of Chinese citizens to this new illness.
"I have to emphasize this is a new disease, and no one on earth has gone through this before," Leo Poon, a public health expert at the University of Hong Kong, told The New York Times. "I hope this pathogen is a less harmful one so it would not cause a major epidemic similar to SARS. It would be a nightmare for all of us."
As of yet, no health workers have contracted the mystery illness, which may indicate that the virus has not begun to spread between people, Wang Linfa, an expert on emerging infectious diseases at the Duke-NUS Medical School in Singapore, told the Times. "We should not go into panic mode," he said.
Hong Kong to add mystery respiratory illness to reportable diseases
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Disease has sent 59 people to the hospital in the mainland Chinese city of Wuhan
The Associated Press ·
Secretary for Food and Health, Prof. Sophia Chan, speaks about response measures to prevent and control a mysterious infectious disease. (Andy Wong/Associated Press
Hong Kong's health chief said Tuesday that a respiratory illness whose cause remains unknown will be added to an official list of diseases that medical practitioners are required to report to the government. The disease — an unidentified form of viral pneumonia — has sent 59 people to the hospital in the mainland Chinese city of Wuhan, in central Hubei province. As of Sunday, seven were in critical condition, while the rest were stable. Municipal authorities have ruled out SARS, the severe acute respiratory syndrome that killed 700 people in 2002 and 2003.
In Hong Kong, a total of 15 patients were being treated Sunday for symptoms including fever and respiratory infection after recent visits to Wuhan. It is not clear whether they have the same illness as the Wuhan patients
Speaking at a news conference, the health chief, Sophia Chan, said the "severe respiratory disease associated with a novel infectious agent" will be added to a list of reportable infectious diseases in Hong Kong's Prevention and Control of Disease Ordinance.
The regulation enables the government to take stronger measures against the spread of certain diseases, such as tuberculosis and chicken pox. Actions under the ordinance could include enforcing quarantines or limiting the movement of people who are suspected to have infections.
"Under the amendment, medical practitioners will have to report suspected cases as well as carry out appropriate investigations and follow-ups to the Center for Health Protection under the Department of Health," Chan said.
The U.S. Consulate General in Wuhan issued a health alert Tuesday for the pneumonia outbreak, warning travellers to Wuhan to avoid animals, as well as animal markets and products.
Dr. Gauden Galea, WHO Representative to China, said public health officials in China "remain focused on continued contact tracing, conducting environmental assessments at the wholesale market, and investigations to identify the pathogen causing the outbreak."
WHO is closely monitoring the event and communicating with counterparts in China, Galea added in a emailed statement
Precautions for travellers
Currently, there are no suspected cases in Canada or involving Canadians overseas, Anna Maddison, a spokesperson for the Public Health Agency of Canada (PHAC) said.
Canada's Chief Public Health Officer, Dr. Theresa Tam, is keeping in close contact with her provincial and territorial colleagues, the agency said. PHAC officials are also in close contact with federal partners, the World Health Organization and other international partners.
Maddison pointed to systems to identify, prevent and control the spread of infectious diseases including a global public health intelligence monitoring system that scans the world's open source media
"No matter the destination, travellers should always take precautions against respiratory and other illnesses while travelling, and seek medical attention if they become ill."
During their trip, Canadian travellers to Wuhan city are encouraged to:
Avoid high-risk areas such as farms, live animal markets, and areas where animals may be slaughtered.
Avoid contact with animals (alive or dead), including pigs, chickens, ducks and wild birds.
Avoid surfaces with animal droppings or secretions on them.
Travellers should also wash their hands often, and practise proper cough and sneeze etiquette.
People are encouraged to tell their health-care providers about their travel if they become ill after returning to Canada.
Toronto Pubic Health said the overall risk to residents is considered very low.
"Given that Toronto Pearson International Airport is an international travel hub, Toronto Public Health is actively monitoring this situation, along with provincial and national health agencies," the department added in a release.
Wuhan ‘pneumonia’: Hong Kong health chief under pressure to seek more information from mainland authorities amid silence on latest patient numbers
Lawmakers grill health secretary Sophia Chan for 2½ hours on the government’s response to the pneumonia situation in Wuhan Hong Kong’s public hospitals admitted eight more people who had been to Wuhan in the past two weeks and presented with symptoms of either fever and respiratory infection or pneumonia Phila Siu,Elizabeth Cheung,Lilian Cheng Published: 12:17pm, 8 Jan, 2020 Lawmakers had questioned whether Hong Kong had enough stocks of masks in the event of an outbreak. Photo: Winson Wong
Hong Kong’s health minister on Wednesday came under pressure to seek more details on the mystery Wuhan pneumonia outbreak from the mainland Chinese government, as lawmakers expressed concerns that authorities there had not released updates on patient numbers since Sunday.
The lawmakers tabled urgent questions on the outbreak as in the 24 hours to noon on Wednesday, Hong Kong’s public hospitals admitted eight more people who had been to Wuhan in central China in the past two weeks and presented with symptoms of either fever and respiratory infection or pneumonia.
This brings the total number of suspected cases in Hong Kong to 38, though 21 patients have been discharged.
Secretary for Food and Health Sophia Chan Siu-chee was grilled for 2½ hours in the Legislative Council on the government’s response to the pneumonia situation in Wuhan. Hong Kong officials increase powers in fight against Chinese ‘pneumonia’ 8 Jan 2020 Some lawmakers said Chan must press the mainland authorities for the genetic map of the Wuhan virus so Hong Kong experts could help look into the disease in case of an outbreak locally. The Hong Kong government also needed to ask the mainland side whether other cities or provinces had also been infected, they said. The Wuhan Municipal Health Commission said on Sunday that 59 people had been infected with the unidentified strain, seven of whom were in a critical condition.
“That was from its last update on January 5. Today is already January 8,” Civic Party lawmaker Tanya Chan said. “Do you have ways to really find out how many cases there are on the mainland at present, in particular in Wuhan? Can you obtain the genetic map?”
The commission said on Wednesday night that eight people with the virus had been discharged from hospital.
No other mainland government agencies had offered any updates. A source said the mainland health authorities were likely to announce results of the investigation on the virus in around a week. Some of the patients infected with the unknown pneumonia have been treated in Jinyintan Hospital in Wuhan. Photo: Jun Mai
The World Health Organisation’s office in China, which said on Sunday it was closely monitoring the disease in Wuhan, offered no updates when asked on Wednesday.
The Hong Kong government on Wednesday made it mandatory for all medical practitioners to notify the authorities of anyone suspected to have contracted the unidentified strain.
This was done by gazetting a bill to amend the Prevention and Control of Disease Ordinance, to include with immediate effect “severe respiratory disease associated with a novel infectious agent” as a statutory notifiable infectious disease. The law empowers officials to put patients in mandatory quarantine
The government has also stepped up checks on visitors coming from Wuhan by train or plane.
Other lawmakers, including the Democratic Party’s Helena Wong Pik-wan, were concerned whether there were also cases in other Chinese cities. They urged the minister to find out as there was no such information. Wuhan pneumonia not Sars, but virus unidentified as more hospitalised 7 Jan 2020 Civic Party lawmaker Kwok Ka-ki, a urologist, said he had talked to public hospital doctors who told him the government knew hardly anything about the Wuhan pneumonia. That made it difficult for doctors to provide the best treatment to those who developed symptoms after returning from Wuhan recently, Kwok added. The health secretary replied that the governments of Hong Kong, Macau and the mainland had in 2005 signed an agreement to notify each other if any major public health incidents were discovered. The government had been in close contact with the mainland authorities and the mechanism had been working well, she stressed. She believed the mainland would tell the Hong Kong government if such pneumonia cases were found outside Wuhan, adding she would continue to ask the authorities for more information about the disease. Mystery pneumonia infects at least 59 people in Wuhan, China Health services sector lawmaker Joseph Lee Kok-long challenged the government’s earlier announcement that the number of isolation beds in public hospitals could be raised from the current 480 to 1,400 in 72 hours. According to the latest figures, 15 out of 17 public hospitals had over-occupancy rates in medical wards as of midnight on Tuesday, ranging from 103 to 131 per cent, because of the higher number of diseases triggered by winter weather. On this, Chan insisted the increase could be done in 72 hours. But she admitted there was “significant room for improvement” regarding the overcrowding in hospitals. Hong Kong set to add mystery pneumonia to list of notifiable diseases 7 Jan 2020 Pro-government lawmakers, including Wilson Or Chong-shing, had concerns as to whether there were enough stocks of masks in the event of a local outbreak. Chan said public hospitals had enough masks to last three months. The government had talked to pharmacies, which said more stocks would arrive in the city in one to two weeks. The Hospital Authority said on Wednesday it was exploring the feasibility of deferring non-emergency surgeries and services among the measures at public hospitals to centralise resources and manpower to cope with suspected cases related to the Wuhan pneumonia. Meanwhile, infectious diseases expert Professor Yuen Kwok-yung from the University of Hong Kong suspected the unidentified virus that led to the Wuhan outbreak was a coronavirus strain from bats. That was because the Wuhan cases were not found with bird flu, flu or other known viruses, but the infections were suspected to be linked to game meat. “Bats still carry around a dozen coronavirus strains,” Yuen said. “There is a reason for us to speculate that the virus spread from bats to some wild animals, and then jumped to humans.” A student at PolyU developed a fever and persistent cough after returning from Wuhan and was taken to hospital. Photo: Handout He said viruses of a few major infectious diseases in the past, including severe acute respiratory syndrome (Sars) in 2003 and Middle East respiratory syndrome, which started in 2012, were also traced back to bats. “Theoretically, it is also possible for bats to spread the virus to humans directly. But very few people eat bats. However, many people eat masked palm civet and other wild animals,” Yuen said. Separately, a third Hong Kong education institution, Polytechnic University, has reported that a student developed a fever and persistent cough after returning from Wuhan recently. The case was reported to the government on Tuesday night and she was in a stable condition on Wednesday. The dormitory where she lived had been sterilised, PolyU said. Additional reporting by Linda Lew
