Breakdown of SARS cases worldwide

I actually feel safe living in SARS hit Singapore

Article taken from The Straits Times


Expats polled give S'pore health care top marks
SINGAPORE, Japan and Hongkong, in that order, are the best prepared in Asia to deal with a major medical crisis such as Sars, a regional survey found.

The survey by the Hongkong-based Political and Economic Risk Consultancy (Perc) follows a report over the weekend that the American State Department did not, in the face of Sars, evacuate officials from its diplomatic mission in Singapore because of the quality of the country's medical care.


The survey said the Sars outbreak was a 'stress-test' for the region's medical systems, and so far China 'gets a failing grade' for the way in which it handled the disease.

Perc asked 1,072 expatriate business executives working in 12 Asian countries and territories to grade their confidence in the ability of hospitals in their host countries to deal with major illnesses.

'Of all the Asian countries, expatriates in Singapore expressed the greatest degree of confidence in the medical system's ability to treat major illnesses,' said the survey, which was made public over the weekend.

A considerable distance behind Singapore were Japan and Hongkong.

'Respondents had the least confidence in Indonesia, followed by India, China and Vietnam,' it added.

On a scale of 0-10, with zero the best grade and 10 the worst, Singapore scored 2.33, followed by Japan (4) and Hongkong (4.21).

Taiwan and Thailand tied at 5.25.

In fifth place was Malaysia (5.33), then the Philippines (6.6), South Korea (7), Vietnam (7.38), China (7.5), India (8) and Indonesia (9.14).

Singapore was, however, behind the United States (0.86), Britain (2.08) and Australia (2.14), which were included for comparison.

In Washington, State Department officials said the concern over quality of medical care had prompted evacuations from its missions in China and Vietnam.

'No airline will evacuate anyone with Sars. The idea is to get them out before they get sick,' said Ms Faye Barnes, director of the department's family liaison office.

Singapore offers advanced medical care, and so is currently not being evacuated, officials said. -- AFP, NYT

 

Sherrie, the girls dad said that in China you pay for medical costs, but insurance is available, or your employer may pay your medical bills. He also said it's not as costly there because you don't have to seen ten different doctors who know about different things, he said if you're a doctor in China you know how to treat the whole person, not just their eyes or their nose or their bones. Makes sense to me!
Gina

 

Sigh, life has to go on.... Schools have reopened and they're telling us how to live with SARS... (Like wash your hands alot..)
This thing is going to be around for a while.

I'm still blaming China....


Worldwide statistics:

Country // reported cases //Deaths
China // 1 336 // 60
HK // 1 150 // 40
Canada // 274 // 13
Singapore // 151 // 10
Vietnam // 62 // 5
Malaysia // 51 // 1
Thailand // 8 // 2

Other countries hit but no deaths so far

Taiwan 23
Australia 5
Japan 4
Indonesia 3
Kazakhstan 1
Laos 1
Philippines 1

France 17
Italy 10
Britain 6
Germany 6
Switzerland 6
Ireland 2
Belgium 1
Romania 1
Russia 1
Spain 1
Sweden 1

USA 166

Mexico 1

Brazil 2

Israel 1
Kuwait 1

South Africa 1

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When they finally come up with the diagnostics kit (soon), i think the numbers reported will rise.