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Friday, May 09, 2003
Mom, tot confined, evaluated for Sars
By Linette C. Ramos
CEBU -- A flight attendant suspected of having the Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome (Sars) and her one-year-old son who manifested Sars symptoms were admitted to a Cebu City hospital last Wednesday night.
Seven other individuals who had close contact with the patients are now quarantined at the attendant's residence in Cebu City. Some doctors and nurses who were the first to attend to the patient are also being quarantined at a private hospital.
CS (real name withheld to protect her and her family) arrived from Hong Kong last May 1 and started to develop fever, cough and colds five days later. She is the first suspected case in Cebu.
An X-ray performed yesterday did not show signs of pneumonia, but local health officials will perform another X-ray later this week to be sure that she does not have Sars.
Her one-year-old child also suffered from fever, cough and colds and is also confined at the North General Hospital (NGH) in Talamban, Cebu City for evaluation.
As of Thursday, the child could not be classified as a suspect case yet because unlike his mother, he did not have a history of travel to a Sars-affected country, said Dr. Junjie Zuasula, regional epidemiologist of the Department of Health (DOH) 7.
CS and her husband left for Hong Kong late last month. She works as a flight attendant for an airline company with direct flights to Hong Kong.
"CS is already a suspect Sars case but we still have to observe her and conduct more tests to find out if she really has the disease. So far, her illnesses and her travel to Hong Kong makes her a suspect case," he told Sun.Star.
As of Thursday, CS and her son were stable and being monitored by DOH 7. She was no longer suffering from fever Thursday and responded well to medication, Zuasula added.
A cumulative total of 6,903 probable Sars cases and 495 deaths have been reported from 29 countries, according to the World Health Organization (WHO). This represents an increase of 186 new cases and 17 deaths (in China, Hong Kong and Taiwan) compared with the day before.
Cebu City Mayor Tomas Osmeņa is expected to issue an executive order Friday declaring the Emergency Rescue Unit Foundation (Eruf) as the lead agency in handling the Sars problem.
Cebu Gov. Pablo Garcia wants the Department of Health (DOH) to inform the public of the real score on recent suspicions of Sars cases in Cebu, so proper measures can be taken.
The governor is calling all mayors in Cebu as well as officials of DOH, Bureau of Immigration and the Bureau of Quarantine to an anti-Sars summit on Monday at the Capitol.
"We can only hope it's not Sars," said Cebu City Sars crisis manager Emilio "Lito" Osmeņa on the suspected Sars cases.
In a series of meetings discussing contingency plans, Eruf board of directors and city officials already agreed to conduct an information dissemination campaign in the barangays.
The Association of Barangay Councils has scheduled the Sars education seminars next week.
Councilor Gerardo Carillo also confirmed that the Cebu City Disaster Coordinating Council (CCDCC) already set up guidelines on the use of the City's P5-million calamity fund intended for Sars.
As agreed by the City Council, the CCDCC will review the requests coursed through the Department of Health.
Carillo, CCDCC action officer, said the council agreed, in a meeting at City Hall Thursday, that the use of the appropriation will be for the purchase of medical equipment and supplies, construction materials for isolation centers, as well as for advocacy and the city-wide cleanliness campaigns.
The City Government has also set aside over P800,000 for medicines, medical supplies and information materials that will be used by the City Health Department.
World Health Organization (WHO) guidelines prescribe that a second X-ray be conducted on suspected Sars patients who are initially negative of pneumonia because pneumonia can develop much later.
"If everything goes well, there is no deterioration in their condition and the second X-ray would show that she is negative of pneumonia, then they can be discharged," Zuasula said.
According to WHO, suspected Sars patients are those who had a history of travel to Sars-affected countries or those who had direct unprotected contact with a confirmed Sars patient and have fever, cough and colds.
Confirmed Sars patients, on the other hand, manifest the signs and symptoms of a suspected Sars case, with an X-ray showing that the patient also has pneumonia.
Even if CS and her son showed the same symptoms, Zuasula said they can't classify the toddler as a suspect case yet.
"That's one thing we're not sure of yet because it is also possible that the organism that downed the boy is different from the organism that sickened his mother," he added.
Although CS and her son are not confirmed Sars cases yet, DOH 7 already placed CS' husband, father, mother, brother, two helpers and another companion in their house to be sure that they are spared from possible Sars infection.
Once further tests show that CS and her son are both negative of Sars, Zuasula said they will also cut short the quarantine period of 14 days prescribed to CS' family and the doctors and nurses.
"We advised that they refrain from leaving their houses. If they really have to go out, it should be within limited distance so that when they start to have fever, they can easily go home and call a doctor," he said.
The family was also advised to monitor their temperature twice a day and to immediately report to DOH 7 any rise in their body temperature. With Charmaine Y. Rodriguez & Jeanette P. Malinao
(May 9, 2003 issue)
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