Travellers alerted to killer disease

By ANGELA GREGORY health reporter

The Ministry of Health is warning New Zealanders against travelling to parts of Asia where a lethal mystery pneumonia strain has been reported.

The World Health Organisation (WHO) has for the first time in a decade issued a global warning after a spread of deaths from the illness, described as Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome.

Nine people have died, including two members of a Canadian family who travelled to Hong Kong and an American businessman who took ill in Hanoi after visiting Shanghai.

More than 150 people are known to have contracted the pneumonia.

The ministry's senior adviser on communicable diseases, Doug Lush, said New Zealanders contemplating non-essential travel to affected countries might want to re-think.

The WHO said incidents of the syndrome had been recorded in Canada, China, Hong Kong, Indonesia, the Philippines, Singapore, Thailand and Vietnam.

Dr Lush said the illness could also make it to NZ on an infected traveller or someone recently in contact with an infected person.

A national public health emergency plan was in place ready to be activated if necessary to combat a mystery pneumonia strain if it reached New Zealand.

People who had recently travelled to the region involved and felt ill should see a doctor immediately.

Symptoms include a high fever (more than 38C), cough, shortness of breath and difficulty breathing.

A New Zealander living in Hong Kong, Dr Duncan Macfarlane, said there was concern at the hospitals but no public panic.

Dr Macfarlane, an exercise physiologist who teaches at Hong Kong University, said he had confidence in the ability of health authorities to take good precautions.

"It is mainly hospital staff who have had to be careful ... Anyone with suspected pneumonia is being treated with due caution."

Staff working with such patients wore masks and surgical gloves.

The mystery virus was not regarded as an epidemic and remained of an unknown origin, he said.

Dr Macfarlane said there had been reports of surgical face masks being handed out at the Hong Kong international airport, but he was unsure whether they were being offered or demanded.

He said there had been far greater concern over the bird-flu virus, which killed six of the 18 people infected in the last outbreak in Hong Kong in 1997.

The Hong Kong Government has repeatedly played down fears of the virus spreading outside the medical community, as has the Hong Kong Tourism Commission.

A special taskforce and expert committee on the respiratory infection has been set up to tackle its spread and investigate its source.

The Hong Kong Government said some patients had a positive response to the drugs used to treat the illness, and there were no signs of any unusual rise in the number of pneumonia cases.

Health Minister Yeoh Eng-kiong said two patients who had been seriously ill were recovering and one would be discharged soon.

"We have effective treatment, but it's not 100 per cent," Yeoh said.

Hong Kong's flagship airline Cathay Pacific said it would screen all passengers for flu symptoms amid a pneumonia outbreak that has made 42 people in the territory ill.

As alarm spreads about the disease, the airline said it had ordered staff in all countries not to allow check-in for any passenger showing signs of the illness.

Principal medical officer Dr John Merritt said company policy was not to allow any passenger known to have an actively infectious disease to board an aircraft.

He said air filters on aircraft removed many of the droplets and particles responsible for spreading infection.

Nonetheless, it was important for passengers who appeared to be ill to be denied boarding and referred for assessment.

Singapore Airlines southwest Pacific spokesman Stephen Forshaw said staff had to be careful when assessing check-in passengers who appeared ill.

"If someone turns up with a runny nose or something, there's nothing to prevent them boarding. Obviously we're trying as best we can to make information available, but it's up to the individual who may be exhibiting symptoms to contact their doctor."

The WHO recommends that any travellers experiencing the combination of symptoms associated with the illness seek medical attention and ensure information about their recent travel is passed on to health care staff.

It advised any travellers who develop the symptoms not to undertake further travel until they have recovered.