Top doctor calls for unity to fight SARS

IRELAND must apply all its health resources together to deal with the SARS threat during the Special Olympics, Ireland’s chief medical officer has said.

Addressing the Oireachtas Health Committee yesterday, Dr Jim Kiely admitted mistakes had been made but stressed that lessons had now been learned. “Lessons need to be learned. I’m confident they will be learned and applied,” he said.

“I think we have the experience, the resources and the capacity to do this. We just need to apply them all at the right time,” he said.

Pressed on the issue of SARS, and the threat to the games by the public health doctor strike, Dr Kiely said he believed the challenge of the games could be met with the goodwill of all sides.

Today Taoiseach Bertie Ahern meets the international organisers of the Special Olympics to discuss the special requirements in order to safeguard against SARS.

The Department of Health is also contacting the embassies of countries involved in the Games to compile information on the prevalence of SARS in each nation.

When pressed by members of the Health Committee on measures taken at points of entry to the country Dr Kiely said measures had been deemed adequate since there was no effective screening test for the SARS virus. Accurate, well informed public health information and rational travel advice was the best way of coping with travel concerns, he said.

“We are determined to continue to draw upon the most up-to-date international and national information and expertise to inform our approach to this disease, to collaborate with our EU and WHO partner member states in the fight against SARS and to maintain a state of readiness to deal with the illness as it evolves,” he said.

However, Dr Fenton Howell of the Irish Medical Organisation denied there was a safe system in place to deal with SARS.

Even if public health doctors went back to work the service would not be adequate since the doctors did not operate around the clock. “There is no out of hours system. There is no safe system in place to deal with SARS,” he warned.

Answering queries about the facilities available for any future SARS cases, ERHA chief executive, Michael Lyons told the committee the largest requirement required to deal with an outbreak was isolation rooms, negative pressure rooms and single rooms with their own bathroom.

Mr Lyons said there were 1,400 such single rooms which could be used nationwide, 1,000 of which were equipped with their own bathroom. That included 60 negative pressure rooms and 80 isolation rooms which are also available to the health authorities. The majority (850) of the available rooms are in the Eastern region. However, plans are in place to share capacity among the health board regions.