Cleveland physician brings calm to the WHO novel coronavirus warning- ‘threat to the world’
During a segment on Studio B with Shepard Smith on Fox News Channel yesterday, the host starts out saying, “health officials are warning that a deadly new virus recently found in humans is quote, a threat to the entire world.”
He was talking about a statement by WHO Director-General Dr Margaret Chan at the 66th World Health Assembly (WHA) Monday where she said, “Looking at the overall global situation, my greatest concern right now is the novel coronavirus. We understand too little about this virus when viewed against the magnitude of its potential threat. Any new disease that is emerging faster than our understanding is never under control,” Dr Chan said. “These are alarm bells and we must respond. The novel coronavirus is not a problem that any single affected country can keep to itself or manage all by itself. The novel coronavirus is a threat to the entire world.”
Dr. Michael Anderson
Image/Video Screen Shot
The shows guest, Dr. Michael Anderson, Chief Medical Officer of University Hospitals Case Medical Center and Rainbow Babies & Children’s Hospital in Cleveland added a little perspective to the World Health Organization’s (WHO) , some one consider, alarmist warning.
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The host says to Anderson, “I know you say don’t panic about this, but when the WHO comes out and says it could be a threat to the entire world, it got my attention.”
Anderson responds, “I would agree with WHO leadership that we take this seriously, obviosly we have to monitor for this type of new virus, the novel coronavirus; however. its 49 cases across the entire globe, with about half of those patients passed away.
“But the good news in this modern health care system, where we reacted to novel H1N1 in the past, or SARS in the past, we got networks out there that monitor for these viruses, and more importantly, respond.
“So I agree with the WHO that we have to take this seriously, we have to monitor for it, but were talking about 44 or 49 cases across the entire globe. It’s gonna take time to see how big this gets.”
The host then asks a good question–How do we protect ourselves against it?, particularly after the WHO reports “we don’t know where it’s hiding and we really don’t know how to detect it.”
Dr. Anderson says, “The first thing is we have to monitor for it.” He notes that CDC and WHO have guidelines to health care providers that basically say “if you see these symptoms, consider the novel coronavirus”.
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“The second is you have to have vigilance”, Anderson says. “If you got a patient that doesn’t make any sense, why in the middle of summer are they so sick from respiratory symptoms?”
Anderson closes by saying, “We’ve learned a lot over that past decade or so, since SARS and since novel H1N1, and this country, and the WHO for the world, are really quite prepared for these kind of epidemics.”
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