Officials check Bangkok hospitals' readiness to treat MERS cases

[webfact]

Officials check Bangkok hospitals' readiness to treat MERS cases
THE NATION

BANGKOK: -- TIGHTER preparation measures to tackle MERS were encouraged at private hospitals as the Health Service Support Department (HSSD) team launched an inspection yesterday at Bangkok's Vejthani Hospital.

Up until now, at-risk MERS suspects in Chaiyaphum and Buri Ram provinces have shown no evidence of the infection.

HSSD director-general Boonruang Triruangworawat led the team to inspect the MERS preparation and screening measures at Vejthani Hospital in Bang Kapi district.

They found that a thermal scan camera had been installed at the hospital's front door where visitors enter through two lanes. A disease-screening checkpoint had been set up and equipped with translators for patients from the Middle East. About 16 per cent of the hospital's patients come from that region.

The HSSD team was told the hospital will quarantine people suspected of having MERS - found to have a fever at the screening area - by transferring them to a special lift to carry them directly to a disease control unit on the building's fourth floor. A doctor would collect body fluid for testing at a MERS laboratory at Chulalongkorn Hospital. Normally, it would take six hours to get test results.

Boonruang said he was pleased with the hospital's readiness to cope with any suspected cases of MERS. However, he criticised the plan to transfer suspected patients to the special lift, as it passes through a crowded area. He suggested the hospital separate patients suspected of having MERS and others by setting a special path to reduce the chance of more people becoming infected.

Meanwhile, Buri Ram Provincial Public Health Office has two people who may have MERS in quarantine. The two returned from countries with reports of MERS but showed no sign of infection.

Health official Dr Sompong Jarungjitjanuson said the two suspects - one male and one female - had been checked for fever twice a day every day for seven days and had not shown any flu symptoms. "The female will be quarantined until July 4 and the male until July 5. However, they will still be checked for a while after release," Sompong said.

Two other MERS "suspects" in Chaiyaphum, who had been to South Korea, have been allowed to go home as they have passed 14 days of quarantine without showing any symptoms and had negative results after three tests for MERS.

Source: http://www.nationmultimedia.com/national/Officials-check-Bangkok-hospitals-readiness-to-tre-30263146.html


-- The Nation 2015-06-26

[Manbing]

Sorted. nuff said.

[sammygood]

the fastest & cheapeast way for a hospital to be mers ready => deny those patients, case closed.

[Jimlove]

"Boonruang said he was pleased with the hospital's readiness to cope with any suspected cases of MERS. However, he criticised the plan to transfer suspected patients to the special lift, as it passes through a crowded area." ...

Is there no end to the idiocy here ... ???

[realenglish1]

Here is the truth about impact MERS is having in Thailand

http://asia.nikkei.com/Politics-Economy/Economy/Thai-tourism-industry-shaken-by-MERS-diagnosis