Virus threat continues to hang over Olympics

WITH just 60 days to go, organisers of the Special Olympics remain concerned the SARS threat could force the Government to ban a number of travelling teams.

A spokesman for the World Games said their first priority had to be public health and safety and any decision by the Department of Health to restrict travel from high-risk countries would be abided by.

“We are being guided by the Department and at the end of the day, they will decide whether a team will or won’t travel. We intend to do whatever is in the best interest of the host towns, the participating athletes and the public in general,” the spokesman said.

Clonmel in Co Tipperary, and Bray and Arklow in Co Wicklow are host towns to delegations from Hong Kong, Singapore and China respectively, the countries most affected by SARS.

Yesterday the first euro commemorative coins to be issued by the Central Bank of Ireland were launched to mark Ireland’s hosting of the Special Olympics. They include a commemorative 10 and 5 coin.

Meanwhile, a German biotechnology company is distributing a new high-speed test for SARS.

The firm Artus is confident the test can confirm the presence of the lethal respiratory disease in two hours, whereas traditional tests for antibodies take more than 10 days.

And Canadian researchers over the weekend published the first entire genetic sequence of the suspected SARS virus.

Speaking on RTE’s Morning Ireland yesterday, Dr Michael Ryan, co-ordinator of the World Health Organisation’s global alert and response programme said identifying the breakthrough make their work a lost easier.

“The important thing coming out of that is the development of much more sensitive diagnostic tests that are going to allow us diagnose the disease much earlier and in more specific ways.

“By understanding the genome we can probably develop specific anti-viral drugs against this specific agent but that takes a very long time because the development process is very long and the safety issues are very real.”

Dr Ryan said he did not believe SARS-specific anti-viral drugs would be developed before the Special Olympics, that it was more likely to be by the end of the year.

Two people are still being monitored for the virus at St James Hospital in Dublin but a spokesman for the Department of Health said they were unlikely to have contracted SARS. They are both from the Far East.

Public health doctors, now in their third day of strike action, are continuing to refuse to monitor or control the spread of infectious diseases, including SARS. The doctors are demanding the Government honour a nine-year old agreement that would put proper pay and structures in place for out-of-hours work. Doctors have so far declined to enter talks.