The Wilful Sunflower

Eight warded for observation

Johor Bahru, Malaysia: Eight people having symptoms similar to Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome (SARS) have been warded for examination and laboratory tests.

Health Ministry Director-General Tan Sri Dr Mohamed Taha Arif said, "I must stress here that they have been warded for further observation.

"Yes, they showed symptoms like high fever and flu but this cannot be regarded as SARS until tests conducted on them confirm that," he said.

Of the eight, one was in Johor, the southernmost state that borders Singapore. The other seven were in the capital city and its environs (where I live and work).

This is NOT good news.

As of yesterday, the World Health Organization reported an increase of 182 cases and 4 deaths worldwide, cumulating in a total of 1804 cases and 62 deaths so far.

An evolving epidemic SARS is a newly identified disease with transmission patterns that are only beginning to emerge and thus difficult to interpret. Much about the disease remains poorly understood, despite great progress in characterization of the causative virus and development of a robust diagnostic test.

On the upside, the situation in Vietnam and Singapore appears to be stable, with few or none new cases detected over the past few days.

However, Hong Kong reported an increase of 155 new cases. Four rural quarantine camps have been set up to accommodate up to a thousand SARS patients.

There have been no suspected SARS cases in neighbouring Indonesia. Thailand, our northern neighbour, reported one new case yesterday, bringing total number of cases there to 6 with one death, that of Dr Carlo Urbani, the first WHO officer to identify the outbreak of this new disease.

Update: 6:30pm - I received a text message on my phone reporting a confirmed SARS death in Malaysia. However, I'm not sure of its veracity as rumours spread easily with little substance; people simply forward text messages, the way they forward uband legend emails. So I'm sceptical.

Latest reports state that Malaysia is still awaiting postmortem findings on a suspected SARS death in Kuala Lumpur, the capital.

A senior health official said it was unlikely the man was a victim of the virus.

The Malaysian man who died developed the symptoms three weeks after returning from China and he was known to be suffering from other ailments.

"There are definitely findings to show at least heart and kidney problems, but going by what has been reported in the other countries this disease is very infectious and happens almost instantly, even affecting people around the victim," a Health Ministry spokeswoman told Reuters.

"In this case his family, his wife and close contacts around him all seem well," she said.

Yesterday, fellow Malaysian blogger Jeff Ooi posted that the Home Ministry issued a directive on Mar 28, ordering English-language newspapers to "adjust" their reports on SARS by leaving out any mention of fatalities.

He writes: "If the official agencies continue to clog information flow, SMS would become an even more deadly carrier for the virus." Too true.

Let's hope they keep us informed.