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2010-01-28 04:17:51 - Epidemic Hazard - China EDIS CODE: EH-20100128-24716-CHN
Date & Time: 2010-01-28 04:17:51 [UTC]
Area: China, Province of Guangdong, , Shantou Number of Infected person(s): 18
Not confirmed information! Description: A hospital in south China's Guangdong Province is under investigation over the bacterial infection of 18 women who had Caesarean sections there last year [2009]. The women gave birth at the Huaqiao Hospital, the largest hospital in Gurao Town of Shantou City, from August to November [2009], an official with the provincial health department said on condition of anonymity. "We received reports of several bacterial infection cases in October [2009] and ordered the local health authority to launch an overhaul of the hospital," he said. But the public knew little of the scandal until the Southern Daily, a Guangzhou-based newspaper, carried a lengthy report on Monday [24 Jan 2010]. The report said at least 7 of the cases had been covered up, which the provincial health department official confirmed in Tuesday [25 Jan 2010]. "We were aware of only 11 cases," he said. "We sent an investigation team to Shantou on Monday and will keep the public informed of the result." The hospital had been told to suspend Caesarean sections, he added.
Laboratory tests found patients were all infected with nontuberculous mycobacteria, or NTM, the same cause of a massive post-surgery infection in 1998 that affected 166 patients at a maternity and child-care hospital in Shenzhen. One of the 7 patients whose conditions were concealed was a woman whose wound has been purulent since she had a Caesarean section at Huaqiao Hospital on 31 Aug 2009. "I was told it was an immunity problem and received antibiotic treatment for months," she was quoted as saying in the newspaper. Until Monday [24 Jan 2010], she and 6 other patients were being treated at the hospital for up to 7 hours daily. Several other patients were told that their wounds had not healed either because they were too skinny or too fat, the newspaper reported. Huaqiao Hospital was founded in 1995 with donations from overseas Chinese. It provides medical services to more than 300 000 people in town.
The name of Hazard: Nontuberculous mycobacteria
Species: Human
Status: Suspected
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