I commend the South China Morning Post for its timely report on May 1 about a five-year-old Hong Kong Nepalese boy, who died of a Sars-like illness a week earlier.
The doctor in charge of the boy's case asked the father for permission to change the wording of the death certificate because the illness was not caused by the new Sars coronavirus, but by an agent that could not be identified.
This incident has highlighted two important questions. The first concerns terminology - and the name Sars (severe acute respiratory syndrome), which has been given to this new and highly contagious disease.
So far, we know that Sars is a type of atypical pneumonia, caused by the new coronavirus, which may take some time to identify in the laboratory (in some cases, its presence cannot be confirmed).
Thus, in the early stage of a case of suspected Sars, with the symptoms of a very severe acute respiratory disease (which the boy did have), should the medical staff inform the patient or his or her family that the patient has 'suspected Sars' or 'suspected atypical pneumonia' (or simply 'atypical pneumonia')?
The exact classification of the disease could have scientific importance, but it could also lead to confusion. Could we just name this atypical pneumonia according to the causative pathogen(s), e.g. 'coronavirus atypical pneumonia'?
Perhaps we can leave it to the World Health Organisation (WHO) to reconsider the appropriateness of the name 'Sars' when we know more about the disease and the agents causing it.
