The Hindu : No SARS case in India: Sushma

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Friday, Apr 11, 2003

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Front Page

No SARS case in India: Sushma

By Gargi Parsai

NEW DELHI APRIL 10. The Centre said today that there was no case of Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome (SARS) in India. The suspected cases in Mumbai, Bhopal and Hyderabad had been found to be "negative" after tests.

Giving clarifications on her statement made in the Rajya Sabha yesterday, the Union Health and Family Welfare Minister, Sushma Swaraj, today assured the House that the Government was fully prepared to meet the situation.

"All foolproof arrangements have been made including setting up of a round-the-clock Control Room with the Directorate-General Health Services and monitoring of passengers arriving on all international flights and at all ports."

A two-pronged strategy was being adopted. One was to work on prevention and the other to isolate suspected cases for treatment in infectious diseases hospitals earmarked for the purpose.

Answering questions raised by Suresh Pachauri (Cong.), N.P. Durga (TDP), Satish Pradhan (Shiv Sena) and Saifuddin Soz (Cong.), Ms. Swaraj said the Government had dispensed with the need for importing the diagnostic kits by acquiring primers to make reagents. The negative and positive controls used in identifying the virus were also being acquired separately.

She said that 2,722 cases of SARS and 106 deaths from it had so far been reported across the globe. The U.S. woman in a Mumbai hospital had been found to be SARS-negative.

The Government made extra efforts to trace out her two friends — Amy and Kelly — who were travelling in Jaipur and did tests on them as a precautionary measure. They too were found to be negative.

Arrangements had been made at the All-India Institute of Medical Sciences, the Safdarjung Hospital and the Ram Manohar Lohia Hospital here to treat any suspected cases of SARS.

"However, since this disease is infectious, they should be treated in specialised hospitals rather than general hospitals and we have identified such hospitals," Ms. Swaraj said.

The tests — which are sensitive and specialised — would be carried out at the National Institute of Virology and the National Institute of Communicable Diseases, she added.