Those suspected of SARS find discrimination
Those suspected of SARS find discrimination
The Jakarta Post, Jakarta
A young woman recently found herself stranded when state-owned PT
Pelni refused to allow her on board passenger ship KM Sinabung as
she attempted to leave Batam island for her home in Cirebon, West
Java.
The women had recently been isolated at Batam General Hospital
because it was suspected that she had Severe Acute Respiratory
Syndrome (SARS). Her name was never made public.
She was eventually cleared by the hospital and discharged, but
that apparently did not satisfy Pelni.
Johny Pandigerot, the head of the Pelni office at the Sekupang
Port in Batam, said his company's policy was not to allow those
suspected of being infected with SARS on board its ships.
"We have no special rooms for passengers with infectious
diseases like SARS. We require an official letter from the local
health authorities if such a passenger wants to board our ship,"
he said.
A member of the local social affairs office in Batam, Jamaris,
expressed his disappointment with Pelni's decision not to allow
the woman to board the ship.
"We purchased a ticket for her and she was allowed to go home
because she had been declared free of SARS. So why did Pelni
reject her?" he asked.
The families of people suspected of being infected with SARS
have also had a difficult time dealing with the disease and its
consequences.
"We just believed what the doctors said. The doctors said our
daughter had to be quarantined so I let my daughter be
quarantined. We just want her to recover soon," said a father
whose daughter was isolated at the Karyadi Hospital in Semarang,
Central Java, after she displayed the symptoms of SARS.
Authorities and hospitals have not released the identities of
patients suspected of having SARS to try and prevent
discrimination.
The man's daughter worked as a domestic helper in Hong Kong
for 18 months. She was taken to the hospital after she came down
with a fever and had respiratory problems soon after she returned
to Kendal, Central Java, last week.
The Karyadi General Hospital has cleared her of SARS
infection, but she has been kept in the hospital for treatment
for pneumonia.
The government has declared SARS to be a national threat. The
disease has claimed victims in China, Hong Kong and Singapore,
and doctors still have not found a cure for it.
Human rights activist Daniel Pandjaitan of the Indonesian
Legal Aid Foundation has said suspected SARS sufferers and their
families must be informed of the procedures they must go through
if they are hospitalized.