No one seems to be writing opinion pieces quite the way I would, so I decided to do it myself.

The name? Taverns are places where one goes to discuss the interesting events and things in the world, so this is my tavern.

I will offer my views on politics, economics, and whatever else strikes my fancy.
I will occasionally publish the entire article from another journal for purposes of causing discussion.

 

SARS

Time Magazine has an excellent piece on SARS. Scary, but excellent.
This is some of the high points.

SARS characteristics

· SARS has about a 6% death rate.
· It appears to be a highly contagious fatal disease which can rapidly spread around the world.
· Partly because of government cover-ups in China, the patterns of its spread are not understood.
· Even sophisticated healthcare systems do not have any effective way to treating the disease.
· The more victims there are, the greater the chance that SARS will spread—and there may be a lot more cases in China than anyone realizes.
·The SARS virus is based on RNA which has no proof-reading mechanism so it is subject to rapid mutation.
· CDC scientists reported last week that the virus is able to survive as long as 24 hours outside the body.
In its early stages, SARS presents the same fevers, muscle aches and diarrhea as flu victims. Reliable tests to distinguish SARS from the flu are not yet available so the public-health system could be quickly overwhelmed.

The physical mechanism by which SARS is spread is still unclear.

o In Hong Kong’s Amoy Gardens, a set of 33-floor apartment towers, Clusters of cases began proliferating. More than 300 residents came down with the illness and at least 15 have died. Many of them seemed to have had no direct contact with one another.

o Doctors first thought that SARS is transmitted by droplets expelled by coughs or sneezes, but there may be other mechanisms such as contaminated fecal matter leaking from a broken sewage pipe.

o Certain people, called superspreaders, appear to pass the disease on with extraordinary efficiency. This mechanism is not understood, either.

It looks to me as though we are waiting for the UN's WHO, the national public health agencies, and the world-wide community of virologists to do their thing.

Addendum
The characteristics of SARS are listed here.
Second Addendum
A new study of the SARS epidemic in Hong Kong, the first major epidemiological study of the illness, indicates that the death rate my be much higher than has been previously reported. New York Times Science Section The death rate may be up to 55% for people 60 and older, and up to 13.2% in younger people.
Also in the New York Times is a description of how Viet Nam has stopped the epidemic there. They have no cure, but they rapidly took the measures required to keep sick people from infecting healthy ones.
posted by Richard at 10:43 PM