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jen · Joined: 20 Jan 2003 Posts: 10

To all those currently in Japan...

What's the SARS situation like? I'm in Toronto and as far as Asia goes, the only places of which I've heard are experiencing any outbreak are China, Hong Kong, Vietnam, rest of SE Asia.
What's going on in Japan? I'm moving there in 10 days so I'd like to know, for example, if there'd be any problems at customs, that sort of thing.
Thanks.

Celeste · Posted: Sat Mar 29, 2003 11:13 pm Post subject:

A friend of mine has been following this story in the news, and he mentioned to me that there had been a couple of suspected cases that had turned out to be the flu.

On New Year's day, I returned to Japan from a hoiday in Korea and Thailand, and for the first time in my travelling career, I had to fill out a quarantine card. This was a yellow card that had questions on it such as flight number, contact number in Japan, what countries I'd visited, and whether or not I had any of a list of symptoms. I don't know if this was due to SARS, but you may have to fill out something similar when you come.

nakanoalien2 · Joined: 04 Mar 2003 Posts: 52 Location: Nakano, Japan

China, HK, Vietnam, Singapore, Germany, Canada are the warning countries that come up most often, but if you read enough articles it is difficult to keep up with this.

Thailand was on the WHO warning list briefly but removed. An Italian WHO doctor died in Thailand of SARs but I think the arguement there was that it was contained.

There have been some suspected but no confirmed cases in JP. Consider this though - usually multinational companies operating in Asia have offices in Tokyo and HK. There's plenty of back and forth travel (in my company, 4 or 5 coworkers in the last few weeks). Probably inevitable.

The little yellow cards are not just for SARs. I got one of those a couple of months ago after returning from Manila. I think they are just standard when there's an outbreak of whatnot.

Bob

Glenski · Joined: 15 Jan 2003 Posts: 12844 Location: Hokkaido, JAPAN

There have been no cases of SARS reported in Japan. Today's Japan Times shows a nice worldwide picture of the affected countries. Too bad that article isn't online.

Joe Thanks · Joined: 07 Feb 2003 Posts: 25 Location: Asia

Glenski · Joined: 15 Jan 2003 Posts: 12844 Location: Hokkaido, JAPAN

The article that you might be referring to, Joe, is here.

http://www12.mainichi.co.jp/news/mdn/search-news/874293/SARS-0-1.html

Since that was published on March 19, and there have been no follow up articles to say that any of these 3 cases have developed further problems, I would have to assume that they did not have SARS, and that they continued with their recovery.

Glenski · Joined: 15 Jan 2003 Posts: 12844 Location: Hokkaido, JAPAN

Or perhaps you read this article from the Yomiuri Shimbun, Society section.

http://www.yomiuri.co.jp/index-e.htm

In it, a Japanese boy was confirmed as having SARS, but he is in Hong Kong, not Japan.

Celeste · Posted: Tue Apr 01, 2003 12:06 am Post subject:

nakanoalien2

PAULH · Joined: 28 Jan 2003 Posts: 4672 Location: Western Japan

Just in case you dont know

SARS stands for Serious Acute respiratory Sickness and is now being carried on airborne particles in Hong Kong

The news has said that a dozen or more (I dont know how many) have died already in Hong Kong (including the doctor who discovered it) and one apartment block of 50 inhabitants has already been quarantined and the residents can not enter or leave the building.

mc · Joined: 20 Jan 2003 Posts: 90 Location: Aichi, Japan

Interesting article:

http://www.fumento.com/disease/sars.html