Ever since the 2003 outbreak of SARS, or severe acute respiratory syndrome, Hong Kong has used infrared scanners to measure the facial temperatures of all arrivals at its airport and at its border crossings with mainland China.
The NYTimes reporting on how Hong Kong is probably better prepared than any other place in the world for a flu pandemic.
Hat tip to Monique van Hoek.
Actually, China still has all of the infrastructure up for this as well. Every airport and train station has temperature sensors at the ticket checks. They just haven’t been in use for the past few years. Sometimes you can see your temperature in the few that are still open.
I’ve also seen them elsewhere in Southeast Asia. I believe Thailand still has quite a few up as well.
South Korea also does IR scanning. There are some anomalies about the camera coverage at some US points of entry that I’ve passed through that suggest to me that the US may be doing at some airports.
It’s not (just?) good government – it’s common sense. Kowloon has the highest population density on the planet, something like 45k people / km2 – any kind of outbreak would spread like wildfire and could kill millions.
THEY ARE DYING IN MEXICO CITY BECAUSE OF THE ELEVATION:
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/15581198
I dunno, maybe it is the elevation that causes low humidity. Elevation makes pneumonia more deadly. Mexico City and San Luis Potosi have high elevations. Not so much Baja Mexico and IDK about Oaxaca, but the majority of deaths are Mexico City.
The origination in Mexico is a complicating factor, but people aren’t dying because they are Mexican, they are dying because they live at high altitude in Mexico City. These cities would be most at risk if global Swine Flu outbreak: http://www.trivia-library.com/a/10-highest-elevation-cities.htm
The severely sickened women in California with a weakened immune system developed diarrhea but *not* pneumonia. If she lived at altitude I bet she would’ve died of pneumonia.
Still corrollaries with first Spanish Flu wave so want vaccine and want to wipe out this weak “wave” and/or animal reservoir ASAP to avoid replaying fall 1919 second wave.
Thanks for your useful info, I think it’s a good topic.
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