The hallways of Hong Kong's schools are eerily silent today. That is because in the wee hours this morning, the city's government ordered all schools closed early for the upcoming Easter holiday. The reason: Influenza, or something like it, has wrought havoc upon Hong Kong's students. Severe outbreaks of respiratory virus have erupted in 25 of the city's schools in recent days, and several children have died.
The situation is not any easier in Hong Kong's hospitals, as some 15,000 hours of overtime have been clocked by nursing staff alone within the past two weeks (hat-tip to ironorehopper of Flutrackers).
Newspaper accounts vary as to the source(s) of the illness. Some call it flu, while others still refer to the malady as "flu-like". At any rate, this illness is now accompanied by another, possibly even more frightening disease: Encephalitis. The most recent HK death was a seven-year-old boy who died yesterday of encephalitis associated with flu-like symptoms. The mention of the very word "encephalitis" among flubies strikes severe apprehension at the best and outright horror at the worst. Encephalitis Lethargica, as you recall, was the "secondary pandemic" to the Spanish Flu pandemic of 1918-19. Think "Awakenings" with DeNiro and Robin Williams. Encephalitis Lethargica existed from 1917 to 1928, when it mysteriously vanished from the planet.
Now here's the interesting latest item: The nation's leading SARS and respiratory distress experts are being called in, apparently in an effort to pin down the origin(s) of the illness. It makes one wonder: If the BBC is saying (as recently as this morning) that this is a "mystery" flu, and the SARS gang is being called in, what in Sam Hill is going on in Hong Kong?
Now add to this discussion the recent words of Zhong Nanshan (see my recent blog post), and you have a lot of wringing of hands and gnashing of teeth in southern China right now.
Update on Wednesday, March 12, 2008 at 04:29PM by
Scott McPherson
