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CNN Live Today

Interview With Dr. Abraham Verghese

Aired April 18, 2003 - 11:34   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.


ANDERSON COOPER, CNN ANCHOR: So what to do about all this fear? What to do about SARS? Well, Abraham Verghese is a professor of medicine at the University of Texas Health Science Center. Now, in an article appearing in Sunday's "New York Times Magazine," Dr. Verghese advocates an aggressive SARS quarantine in the U.S., and he joins us from San Antonio this morning.
Dr. Verghese, I read the article. It is an interesting idea. Right now, the CDC is recommending isolation for SARS patients. You say that's not enough. Quarantine is neccessary -- why?

DR. ABRAHAM VERGHESE, PROFESSOR OF MEDICINE, UNIVERSITY OF TEXAS: Well, I think all the other countries in the world that are dealing with SARS are quarantining, by which we mean taking perfectly healthy people, like you and I, and confining their movements. It is sort of a draconian measure, but it seems to be what's controlling the infection in Toronto and Singapore to the degree that they're successful. Here in America, the CDC is recommending isolation, and even though President Bush has signed the quarantine order, we have stopped short of recommending quarantine.

My concern is, from reading all these instances of spread within a hospital setting, the spread from a hotel, the Metropol (ph) in Hong Kong, that we should be more willing to institute quarantine, and the drawback is always the issue of personal freedom, and in the United States, I think we're a little reluctant, but this disease justifies that.

COOPER: Well, let me ask you about that. Just the very word "quarantine" brings up a lot of bad memories for many people, and certainly in the past, in U.S. history going back long ago, there were some very inappropriate uses of quarantine, particularly against immigrant groups, I think, against Russian Jews in New York back in the 1800s. What do you say to those people who say quarantine is too extreme?

VERGHESE: Well, I think at the back of the minds of most infectious disease practitioners like myself, is the fear that this may be the equivalent of the Spanish influenza of 1918. And as you know, that had a mortality of about 3 percent, but that 3 percent translated to 20 million deaths worldwide in 18 months. This SARS has that potential, and I think if we want to be careful while we're waiting to get treatment, while we're developing a test, I think we shouldn't be too concerned about the metaphor of quarantine, given the severity of this disease and its propensity to affect people by direct contact, as you pointed out earlier. COOPER: Well, how would this quarantine work? Would it just be in hospitals, would it be in people's homes? I mean, nuts and bolts, how does it work?

VERGHESE: Well, we just have to look at Toronto and Singapore. Not that these are ideal models, but take Toronto, where 500 people in a religious group who attended a funeral of someone who died of SARS, they are all being confined to their houses for 10 days. An entire hospital has been locked down. In Singapor, they shut schools. In Hong Kong, they took the entire population of an apartment building, and took them to a resort somewhere where they were out of the -- out of touch with the rest of the population. These are hard measures, tough for us to swallow, but I'd hate to have us resort to that only after we've been burnt. I'd rather see us be more aggressive, and the CDC come forward and recommend quarantine for those clearly exposed.

COOPER: And those are extreme measures, to say the least. And just a final word, is it justified? As you know, there's some 3,000 -- I think -- 293 or so cases of SARS worldwide. There have only been about 159 deaths registered so far. Is it justified, that level of quarantine?

VERGHESE: I think so, in order to control it. In the U.S., we're at a great point. We only have, maybe, 20 cases, and I think we have a wonderful opportunity to contain it if we move quickly.

COOPER: All right. Dr. Verghese, appreciate you joining us. Interesting stuff.

VERGHESE: Thank you.

TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com







Aired April 18, 2003 - 11:34   ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
ANDERSON COOPER, CNN ANCHOR: So what to do about all this fear? What to do about SARS? Well, Abraham Verghese is a professor of medicine at the University of Texas Health Science Center. Now, in an article appearing in Sunday's "New York Times Magazine," Dr. Verghese advocates an aggressive SARS quarantine in the U.S., and he joins us from San Antonio this morning.
Dr. Verghese, I read the article. It is an interesting idea. Right now, the CDC is recommending isolation for SARS patients. You say that's not enough. Quarantine is neccessary -- why?

DR. ABRAHAM VERGHESE, PROFESSOR OF MEDICINE, UNIVERSITY OF TEXAS: Well, I think all the other countries in the world that are dealing with SARS are quarantining, by which we mean taking perfectly healthy people, like you and I, and confining their movements. It is sort of a draconian measure, but it seems to be what's controlling the infection in Toronto and Singapore to the degree that they're successful. Here in America, the CDC is recommending isolation, and even though President Bush has signed the quarantine order, we have stopped short of recommending quarantine.

My concern is, from reading all these instances of spread within a hospital setting, the spread from a hotel, the Metropol (ph) in Hong Kong, that we should be more willing to institute quarantine, and the drawback is always the issue of personal freedom, and in the United States, I think we're a little reluctant, but this disease justifies that.

COOPER: Well, let me ask you about that. Just the very word "quarantine" brings up a lot of bad memories for many people, and certainly in the past, in U.S. history going back long ago, there were some very inappropriate uses of quarantine, particularly against immigrant groups, I think, against Russian Jews in New York back in the 1800s. What do you say to those people who say quarantine is too extreme?

VERGHESE: Well, I think at the back of the minds of most infectious disease practitioners like myself, is the fear that this may be the equivalent of the Spanish influenza of 1918. And as you know, that had a mortality of about 3 percent, but that 3 percent translated to 20 million deaths worldwide in 18 months. This SARS has that potential, and I think if we want to be careful while we're waiting to get treatment, while we're developing a test, I think we shouldn't be too concerned about the metaphor of quarantine, given the severity of this disease and its propensity to affect people by direct contact, as you pointed out earlier. COOPER: Well, how would this quarantine work? Would it just be in hospitals, would it be in people's homes? I mean, nuts and bolts, how does it work?

VERGHESE: Well, we just have to look at Toronto and Singapore. Not that these are ideal models, but take Toronto, where 500 people in a religious group who attended a funeral of someone who died of SARS, they are all being confined to their houses for 10 days. An entire hospital has been locked down. In Singapor, they shut schools. In Hong Kong, they took the entire population of an apartment building, and took them to a resort somewhere where they were out of the -- out of touch with the rest of the population. These are hard measures, tough for us to swallow, but I'd hate to have us resort to that only after we've been burnt. I'd rather see us be more aggressive, and the CDC come forward and recommend quarantine for those clearly exposed.

COOPER: And those are extreme measures, to say the least. And just a final word, is it justified? As you know, there's some 3,000 -- I think -- 293 or so cases of SARS worldwide. There have only been about 159 deaths registered so far. Is it justified, that level of quarantine?

VERGHESE: I think so, in order to control it. In the U.S., we're at a great point. We only have, maybe, 20 cases, and I think we have a wonderful opportunity to contain it if we move quickly.

COOPER: All right. Dr. Verghese, appreciate you joining us. Interesting stuff.

VERGHESE: Thank you.

TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com