S A R S - over-reacting?

[foundationist.org]

Chinese guests barred from film festival

Hysteria or not?

SARS has a low death rate, has killed around 100 people worldwide.

Malaria has a higher death rate, will kill around 3 million people this year.

Is the whole issue of SARS nothing more than "diseases of the rich"?

 

[Talia]

SARS is feared because it is an unknown. We always fear the unknown and become accustomed to familiar tragedy. Human nature.

 

[maya]

aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaachoooooooooooooooooo!
;D

 

[brian]

Bless you!

 

[Blue]

SARS has a low death rate, has killed around 100 people worldwide.

Is it not the case that China has sacked its Minister in charge of Health, because the real figures have been covered up?

There is, I believe, a real chance of a pandemic if precautions are not taken, like the isolation of some recent returneees from the area being isolated on the I of W this last week in the UK.

I don't think we can ever under-react to biohazards of this kind.
:

 

[foundationist]

Certainly a valid point. I simply cannot help but think in relative terms of Malaria. A popular figure is that at least 1 million people will die of the disease this year - the majority being children - and generally in third world sub-Saharan Afirca. It is said that every 30 seconds a child in Africa dies from Malaria. In context with that I find it hard to consider SARS in so serious terms. With only a few thousand infection, a couple of hundred deaths, coupled with a low rate of infection, I just don't see the panic justified - certainly at the moment. My goodness, smoking will kill around 50,000 Britons this year. (Time to quit it, Brian )

 

[foundationist.org]

Actually, maybe I was beiong a little harsh on the matter. Someone reminded me the other day that there is no cure for the common cold - and that's precisely what SARS is supposedly closely related to.

Here's something about it's writhing mutations from a BBC article:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/health/2966117.stm

 

[Cloud Woman]

Expect a future where people can engineer their own pathogens. I don't say that lightly. I also don't mean to say that SARS is made that way, just to expect worse to come on the disease front.