- HONG KONG (Reuters) - A deadly
respiratory virus has infected more medical workers in Hong Kong, the city
government said on Saturday as a top doctor warned that the health system
was in crisis.
-
- Ten health workers were among 39 new cases of Severe
Acute Respiratory Syndrome (SARS) that the government revealed on Saturday.
Hong Kong now had 800 cases of the pneumonia-like disease, officials said.
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- Three more people had died, taking the toll to 20.
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- Staff shortages and the burden of SARS cases have forced
major Hong Kong hospitals to suspend services that would normally be considered
essential. "Emergency services at Prince of Wales Hospital and Princess
Margaret Hospital have stopped," Dr. Tse Chun Yan, a senior physician
at one hospital, wrote in a memo to his staff.
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- "Queen Elizabeth Hospital is full... Many other
hospitals are in a similar situation. The entire Hospital Authority is
in crisis," the Ming Pao newspaper quoted him as saying in the memo.
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- The Hospital Authority supervises Hong Kong's health
system.
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- At least a dozen staff members at Tse's own hospital,
United Christian, have been infected with SARS in the past few days.
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- SARS has killed almost 90 people worldwide and has infected
over 2,500. The outbreak started in southern China late last year before
moving to Hong Kong, Singapore, Vietnam, Canada, Germany and elsewhere
in recent weeks.
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- "Princess Margaret Hospital has made available many
rooms in three days to take in more SARS patients," Tse wrote, briefing
staff on conditions at one of Hong Kong's biggest hospitals.
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- "Up to now, Princess Margaret Hospital has altogether
more than 400 cases. The situation has become very critical."
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- The government said on Saturday that Prince of Wales
Hospital would resume its emergency services on Sunday to take pressure
off other hospitals.
-
- But even as it made that announcement, yet another hospital,
Alice Ho Miu Ling Nethersole Hospital, was suspected of having SARS-infected
staff. The government called for anyone who had visited particular wards
at that hospital to contact the Department of Health.
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- The flu-like symptoms of SARS have put more stress on
the hospitals.
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- The head of an industry body that represents general
medical practitioners told a radio program on Saturday that some doctors,
fearing that they would contract SARS, were turning away common flu patients
and sending them to the overstretched public hospitals.
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- Another doctor from United Christian told Ming Pao: "We
cannot only look after SARS patients. Heart disease is equally fatal. Operations
on patients with heart disease have stopped for a week now."
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- United Christian has admitted about 200 SARS patients
so far. Most have been residents of Amoy Gardens, a Hong Kong apartment
complex where the disease spread like wildfire.
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