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May 26, 2003

SARS(?)-Vallejo, California

Sierra Times: A health worker at Kaiser Hospital, Vallejo, California, says a respiratory illness killed 12 in early May. She and 3 colleagues are ill with a disease that resembles SARS. Their hospital has declared at least one 'suspected SARS' case in a patient, plus, apparently, a 'probable' SARS case in a pharmacist who had travelled to Taiwan. [Hat-tip to 'shah8'.]


A worker in respiratory technology, from Vallejo, California, has been ill for over 3 weeks with an undiagnosed acute illness. She says 12 patients at her workplace, Kaiser Hospital died in the first week of May with a related respiratory disease. Most were age 70-85 with pre-existing diseases of the heart or lungs. The patients had severe respiratory failure, sometimes kidney failure. She says that California state officials reviewed the charts, but would not diagnose the cases as SARS, because there had been no autopsies.

She says that 3 colleagues have had illnesses similar to hers. Some of them had contact with a 'suspected' SARS case that was being managed in the Kaiser Permanente Hospital.

Astraea Kelly, the respiratory technologist, has been a SEIU Local 250 steward at Kaiser Hospital, Vallejo and has worked 20 years in health care. She was interviewed on Jeff Rense's talk-radio program.

For her May 21 interview, A Real Player audio file is here. Astraea's interview starts at the 2-hour mark.

Vallejo Times-Herald Online, May 21:


The Times-Herald received an e-mailed message from a reader saying a Kaiser employee told him about the sick individual, a pharmacist, and questioned what is being done to protect the public.

"A pharmacist down there has SARS," this family member[family member of a Vallejo Kaiser Permanente Hospital employee] said. "And apparently now there's another one who's sick. And apparently, no one in authority is telling anybody anything. Everybody knows this guy was really sick Friday. They asked him if he wore a mask while he was in Taiwan, and he supposedly said, 'nah.'"

Solano County Public Health Officer Dr. Tomas Charron confirmed there have been five cases of suspected SARS reported in the county in the past four to six weeks - three of them from Kaiser, and one of them Monday. But, he added, only three of the cases are still suspected, one is a probable that cleared up, and none has been confirmed as SARS.


Fairfield Daily Republic, May 22:


VALLEJO -- An area hospital reported a new suspected case of Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome to the state this week, public health officials said Wednesday.

At the same time, the state determined that a previously reported Solano County case is probably SARS while another definitely wasn't, said Robin Cox, the county's Health Education Director.

Kaiser Medical Center in Vallejo told Solano County Public Health Monday it treated a man who met the case definitions outlined by the Centers for Disease Control for SARS, Cox said. That brings the total number of Solano cases reported so far to four... [One of the suspected cases was found to have a non-SARS illness.--docbear]

"So the grand tally is still three, one probable, two suspected," she said.

Napa News.com, May 22:


The patient is under the care of Kaiser Permanente in Vallejo, and Charron and his staff are working with Kaiser staff to "to complete the required protocol that is done for all suspected SARS cases throughout the United States," the Solano County Health Department said...

Laboratories at Kaiser Vallejo, Solano Public Health and the California Department of Health Services are currently performing multiple lab tests on the patient to help identify the cause of the viral-like illness, the Solano County Health Department said.

According to Kaiser Vallejo public information officer Valerie Roberts Gray, the patient has some of the risk factors present in SARS cases: travel to a SARS-infected area, possible exposure to SARS, severe coughing, difficulty in breathing, shortness of breath and a fever of 100.4 degrees or higher.

Roberts Gray said that this was the third suspected case fitting criteria set by the Center for Disease Control that has been reported to the county, but the other two were low probability cases.

"There have been no confirmed diagnoses of SARS disease yet in Solano County," [Solano County Health Director, Thomas] Charron said.


 Posted by docbear @ 05/26/2003 11:05 AM | TrackBack