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2010-03-29 05:45:12 - Epidemic Hazard - Canada EDIS CODE: EH-20100329-25501-CAN
Date & Time: 2010-03-29 05:45:12 [UTC]
Area: Canada, Province of Nova Scotia, Nova Scotia-wide, '!!! WARNING !!! Not confirmed information! Description: A norovirus-like illness has caused several Nova Scotia hospitals and long-term care facilities to place restrictions on visitors. Haliburton Place, a long-term facility at Hants Community Hospital, is the latest location to impose visitor restrictions because of the norovirus-like illness, which is like a stomach flu. Over the weekend, a nursing unit at Dartmouth General Hospital and another nursing unit at the Halifax Infirmary were also closed to visitors, except for compassionate reasons. Carmen MacKenzie, a spokesperson at the Capital District Health Authority, said nursing homes and hospitals can be easy places for the virus to spread. "Just as this spreads easily on, say, a cruise ship or in an elementary school, where a lot of people are in a small, confined space, that's the same thing with a hospital or a nursing home and it's just living in close proximity," MacKenzie said. MacKenzie said norovirus infections are usually seen at this time of year. Symptoms include sudden nausea, vomiting, diarrhea and stomach cramping. The norovirus usually isn't life-threatening unless the patient is very elderly or becomes dehydrated. Visitor restrictions can only be lifted at the units if four days pass with no new cases or the virus. MacKenzie said the illnesses at the three locations are likely not connected. "They're in quite different locations so that's very highly unlikely that they are connected," MacKenzie said. "It is out in the community so it's more likely that it's just sort of spreading throughout the community and people just popped in to visit and that's how it happened." Officials say anyone who has been sick should stay away from nursing homes and hospitals for at least three days after the symptoms pass because people can still transmit the virus during that time. The weekend closures come roughly two weeks after a general surgery unit at the Infirmary site of the Queen Elizabeth II Health Sciences Centre in Halifax closed its doors to visitors because of an outbreak of the norovirus. At that time, the Birches Nursing Home in Musquodoboit Harbour also closed itself to visitors because of the norovirus.
The name of Hazard: Norovirus-like illnesses
Species: Human
Status: Confirmed
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