Health chief tells of quicker tests in wake of SARS

Beatrice Siu
Monday, February 25, 2013

Hong Kong may conduct rapid tests for the novel coronavirus earlier than elsewhere after years of vigilance over SARS, Secretary for Food and Health Ko Wing-man said.
Since September, when the novel coronavirus emerged in Saudi Arabia, there have been 13 confirmed cases, including seven deaths overseas.
The latest case involved a patient who was hospitalized in Saudi Arabia on January 29 and died on February 10. The World Health Organization revealed this on Friday.
Ko said what impressed him most during the SARS outbreak 10 years ago was the solidarity of the community and medical staff.
The government will keep working on building medical facilities, reinforcing the risk reporting system and training more doctors specialized in infectious diseases.
"We will not be laid back," Ko said, reminding the public to maintain personal hygiene and not to touch or eat wild animals.
The president of the American College of Chest Physicians (Hong Kong & Macau Chapter), Johnny Chan Wai- man, said the novel coronavirus has a more than 50percent mortality rate and may replicate in two days.
While person-to-person transmission is possible, Chan said experts still do not know much about the illness.
Meanwhile, frontline medical staff shared their memories of the 2003 SARS outbreak in Hong Kong.
A specialist in respiratory medicine, Yeung Koon-sing, was infected while a medical student at Ward 8A of Prince of Wales Hospital, where the index patient was first treated.
Wh en Yeung was about to be discharged, his father was admitted to Ward 9A and died of heart disease.
Joseph Sung Jao-yiu, who was the associate dean (clinical) of the Chinese University's Faculty of Medicine, arranged for Yeung to bid his father a final goodbye garbed in protective gear.
"I thought I had lost a reason to become a doctor because of his death," Yeung said. "I refused to shave or shower and was in shock for a few days."
He said his girlfriend - who later became his wife - paid him a visit in the ward.
"Someone in protective gear tapped me on the shoulder and I realized it was her. She told me to keep going and said `your father doesn't want you to fall."'
A registered nurse in respiratory medicine, Natalie Chan Ho-yan, who also served in Ward 8A, said most of the staff in the ward were infected.
"We encouraged each other to overcome the hardship," Chan said. Her mother would bring food but was not allowed to go inside the hospital. http://www.thestandard.com.hk/news_detail.asp?we_cat=4&art_id=131355&sid=39060427&con_type=3&d_str=20130225&fc=10