Chinese athletes may face virus screening

CHINESE athletes competing in the Special Olympics in June may be screened for SARS in a bid to minimise the health risks posed by the virus.

It is just one of a number of options presented by the Chinese Ambassador, Sha Hailin, to Health Minister Micheál Martin, yesterday.

The ambassador said the Chinese government was particularly anxious that their athletes should participate in the games in Ireland.

All of the detailed preventative measures suggested by the Chinese government, including quarantine and medical supervision, will be considered by the National Expert Committee of SARS.

The expert committee will also seek the opinion of a World Health Organisation expert who will travel to Ireland this week.

Mr Martin said both he and the ambassador were anxious that there should be no discriminatory moves made in relation to the Ireland's Chinese community. They now intended to work together to see how they could best inform the Chinese community about the dangers posed by the virus.

Mr Martin said about 100,000 leaflets a day were now being issued at all ports and airports where information desks were already in place. The leaflets were also being placed on cross-border trains.

The department's chief medical officer, Dr Jim Kiely said Ireland was following the same WHO guidelines as Vietnam, the first country to have the disease under control after reporting no new cases in the last 20 days.

"We are very confident that we can make sure that SARS is not spread within Ireland by the application of those same measures in a very effective and a very pro-active way," he said.

Dr Kiely said the situation in Ireland remained the same there had been five probable cases and one suspect case reported to the department.

He also pointed out that the department would not be using names, location, race, occupation or gender in relation to possible future SARS cases.

The identification of any community as a potential source was very counterproductive, he said. "If there is public focus on an individual nationality there is a possibility of people not coming forward and presenting themselves for treatment," he said.

He pointed out that the WHO hoped that a diagnostic test would be available in a matter of weeks. At that stage the expert group would consider the best way of using the test.

A guidance on the management of SARS patients will be signed off by the expert group early today.

Meanwhile, Europe's health ministers will hold an emergency meeting in Brussels on Tuesday to discuss the SARS epidemic.

EU Health Commissioner David Byrne asked for the meeting to be called to discuss crisis management in the event of the disease getting out of control in Europe.

So far there have been over 80 suspected cases, including one in Ireland. The EU is monitoring the situation through the EU Network of Communicable Diseases.

While it has no power to take any action itself about the crisis, it is helping to collect and distribute information about reported incidents.

A spokesperson for Mr Byrne yesterday welcomed the decision by the Greek presidency to call the meeting.

"We hope the ministers will review the situation and discuss any steps they may need to take to prepare for a serious outbreak," he said.