Tuesday, April 28, 2009

What people in Mexico are saying

BBC NEWS | Have Your Say | Swine flu: Your experiences: "I'm a specialist doctor in respiratory diseases and intensive care at the Mexican National Institute of Health. There is a severe emergency over the swine flu here. More and more patients are being admitted to the intensive care unit. Despite the heroic efforts of all staff (doctors, nurses, specialists, etc) patients continue to inevitably die. The truth is that anti-viral treatments and vaccines are not expected to have any effect, even at high doses. It is a great fear among the staff. The infection risk is very high among the doctors and health staff.

There is a sense of chaos in the other hospitals and we do not know what to do. Staff are starting to leave and many are opting to retire or apply for holidays. The truth is that mortality is even higher than what is being reported by the authorities, at least in the hospital where I work it. It is killing three to four patients daily, and it has been going on for more than three weeks. It is a shame and there is great fear here. Increasingly younger patients aged 20 to 30 years are dying before our helpless eyes and there is great sadness among health professionals here.
Antonio Chavez, Mexico City"

---------
I found this link on Instapundit. It is a BBC site where people post their comments. Dr. Chavez tells a disturbing story and his isn't the only one. Of course there is no way to verify these accounts, but I am inclined to think that the Mexican government is understating the extent of the public health emergency they are facing. And I'm wondering if our own government is doing the same. Every day planes arrive from Mexico City at O'Hare Airport in Chicago (and many other US airports) and unload a few hundred people who left ground zero for this infection a few hours earlier. It seems that whatever the Mexican people are now dealing with, we here in the US will soon be experiencing.

No comments: