NEW YORK -- According to Dr. Stephen Ostroff, associate director
for epidemiologic science in the CDC's National Center for
Infectious Diseases, until it is easier to identify SARS, people
with SARS-like symptoms who have traveled to the hardest-hits areas
will be suspect.
"We can't not take these steps [like Customs agents pulling
aside arriving passengers for medical evaluation based on a
suspicion of SARS] ... we have to cast a wide net," Dr. Ostroff
said at the International Society of Travel Medicine here May
8.
That's "not unreasonable," he said, while acknowledging that
sometimes the wrong people will be "trapped."
Meanwhile, on SARS and Toronto, a World Health Organization
official -- Dr. Isabelle Nuttall, medical officer for international
travel and communicable diseases -- said at the ISTM conference the
city was included in a WHO travel warning and later removed "after
a careful review of all data available... the same as is done for
all areas."
When pressed to acknowledge political pressure from Canada, she
would have none of it: "We are a public health organization,"
Nuttall said.