Case Study

Aaron Liu, age 32 lived in Guangdong Province in China. He worked at the local clinic and was considered to be one of the best doctors in the area. Aaron was a family man and he loved to come home to dinner cooked by his lovely wife, Kai, with the helping hands of their two children.  Jun, his five year old boy, would always run to the table as soon as he entered the house, and Hana, his two year old daughter, would need to be brought to the table by Aaron. Aaron loved his children and every night before bed he would read them a story and kiss them good night. Although Aaron spent a lot of time at home, he was always being called to come back to the clinic to help people all hours of the day. When Aaron was not working, he would take the family out on picnics in the field near his house, or he would see his friends at the local bar.

                One day at the clinic, a young boy came to the clinic all by himself. The boy didn’t say who he was, but Aaron determined that he had a high fever, headache, and a dry cough. Aaron thought the boy just had a cold and was not worried. Therefore he ignored safety protocols doctors take when coming into contact with infectious people. The boy didn’t feel well so Aaron sat him on a chair and began asking questions, but the boy didn’t reveal who he was or any information about him. Aaron was worried about the boy so he left the room to get medicine to treat the flu like symptoms. As Aaron entered the room he walked over to the boy so he could put the pills in the boys hand and gave him a small cup filled with cold medicine, the boy took the medicine. The Boy swallowed back the medicine in one gulp, but after he swallowed the medicine the boy began to cough with Aaron standing right in front of him. Aaron recoiled as he felt the wetness of the cough hit his face.

 Aaron left the room and went to the bathroom to clean his face to try and remove all the possible germs now lying on his face. When Aaron returned, the boy was nowhere to be found.  After a search for the boy, which didn’t result in anything, the clinic began to get quiet waiting for another person needing help. The clinic was quiet for the next few days getting a few visitors each day for normal things, such as a cold, gash, or burns. Around seven days after the incident with the little boy, Aaron woke up one morning with his whole body aching and a severe headache. He didn’t think it was a big deal because yesterday he worked hard cleaning the house with his wife. Later that day though, the pained worsened and he believed he was developing a fever. So he went home immediately not wanting to get his coworkers sick with what he thought was a cold. When he got home he went to sleep, and he woke up the next day with the same pains traveling around his body and a painful headache that would not go away. On top of that, he now had a cough. Again Aaron thought it was a cold so he didn’t worry about all of these symptoms, all he would do was take cold medicine and an aspirin.

As days went on the illness was still with Aaron and he began to worry, so he went to the local hospital a two hour journey by car. When Aaron arrived it was about 8:00 p.m. and it was just getting dark. As he walked into the waiting room, he saw a row of chairs where he sat as he waited to be looked at by a doctor. Around 8:30 p.m. he was called and followed a young nurse into the room where a doctor would be with him shortly. A few minutes later an old doctor came into the room and began to ask Aaron questions. Aaron immediate told him how he felt and what symptoms he had, while Aaron was talking he emphasized that he did not believe it was a cold due to the duration of the sickness. The doctor began to ask Aaron about his job, and if he had any unusual patients in the last few days. Although he didn’t think anything of it he mentioned the young boy, who came into the clinic and disappeared. Through further investigation the doctor had a possible conclusion to what Aaron had, the doctor thought he might have come into contact with the SARS Virus.

The doctor took sample of his blood to examine it for the SARS virus and told Aaron to stay in his room. He also emphasized that he should not touch people, as he finished saying that the doctor handed a surgical mask to Aaron and said please wear this. The two days later the doctor reported back to Aaron with bad news, he had contracted the SARS virus. Aaron was shocked and was frightened, he asked a lot of question involving the virus. One of the first being,  “Am I going to die?” The doctor calmed Aaron down and explained to Aaron that the death rate was low, but little is known about the SARS virus. Then the doctor said something that scared Aaron the most there is no cure. The doctor left the room and came back with pain medications saying that all he could do was treat the symptoms and let the virus play its course.

As the days went on Aaron’s condition worsened and he began getting sicker. He began getting increasingly frightened as time went on. The doctor tried to comfort him by saying things like the SARS virus only kills about ten percent of its victims. This did not help him; if anything it just frightened him more making him wonder if he was going to be part of the ten percent. Each day the doctor would come and visit him for a little bit as he administered the medications Aaron needed. Two days later around midnight Aaron began to have trouble breathing. His immune system was failing, and his airways were closing. At 1:30 a.m. Aaron died on the operation table, the doctors could not get his airway open in time. A few days later hospitals began to get numerous cases of SARS, an outbreak has started.