[MLUG - DISCUSSION] SARS update today was really scary.

[Jonathan King <EMAIL:PROTECTED>]

OK, so it looks to me like the place to focus on with regard to SARS is
Hong Kong, where the reporting is more than a handful of cases, the
reporting is probably fairly complete and where there is something
resembling a modern medical system.  And the news there is really, really 
grim:
              Cumulative
           #cases  #deaths
March 29      470       10
March 31      530       13
April 01      685       16

So the death rate is just over 2%, while the cumulative number of cases in
Hong Kong is now almost exactly 1/10000 of the population of Hong Kong.  
Or, rather, it was yesterday.  If the number of cumulative cases keeps
going up by 30% per day, I predict you'll see a hard quarantine of the
area (and not just a travel advisory) within a week.  The government of
China, which is loathe to admit *any* kind of health problems in the
country (and which therefore officially ignored the AIDS epidemic in the
country for years) has actually started to cooperate with the WHO more
completely.  They had over 800 cumulative cases as of February 28, but
have not released updated figures since then.  That data, though, is
really important in predicting the future of the epidemic in Hong Kong and
elsewhere.  The fact that they have decided to cooperate suggests that
they are really very concerned.

The only silver lining detail I see so far is that Hong Kong is one of the 
most densely populated places on the globe, so that it could be the case
that an epidemic would spread much less quickly or virulently in less 
densely populated places like the US.  Which wouldn't prevent Asia from
being devastated, of course.

jking



_______________________________________________
discussion mailing list
EMAIL:PROTECTED
http://mlug.missouri.edu/mailman/listinfo/discussion