Update on SARS.(Infectious Dis-EASE)(severe acute respiratory syndrome )

Publication: Urologic Nursing

Publication Date: 01-APR-04

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COPYRIGHT 2004 Jannetti Publications, Inc.

On March 12, 2003, the World Health Organization (WHO) issued a global alert for a deadly new infectious disease with the potential to spread rapidly from person to person and via international air travel (WHO, 2003a). First reported in Asia in February 2003, severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS) spread to more than two dozen countries in North America, South America, Europe, and Asia. WHO and its partners, including the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), promptly initiated an investigative and control effort that quickly led to the identification of a previously unknown coronavirus called SARS-associated coronavirus or SARS-CoV. By late July, no new cases were being reported and the WHO considered the illness contained (WHO, 2003b).

During the 2003 outbreak, 8,098 people became sick with SARS, and of these, 774 died (CDC, 2004a). In the United States, 192 suspected SARS cases were...

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