Masking Fear

On prevention in the age of SARS.

by Helen i-lin Hwang

"Running out fast." "… N95 disposable masks have arrived in limited quantities. Any orders received after stock has been depleted will be placed on a waiting list." "No international shipping orders," warned various websites I came upon when I Googled for SARS masks. I was looking specifically for 3M N95, the premier, top-of-the-line masks.

Except for my immediate family, all my other relatives live in Taiwan, one of the major epicenters of the SARS epidemic. The country I was born in has remained on CDC and WHO travel advisories since the early stages of the health plague.

Before SARS came along, the 3M N95 masks were worn to prevent tuberculosis or while sanding floors. The number 95 means that 95 percent of airborne particles get filtered out. In Taiwan, mask prices rose up to $20 per mask when they should cost $3. The government stepped in and found 10 million masks in storage, stuck at an airport warehouse. Some business importers, foreseeing the demand, shipped in the bulk of the masks and were waiting for the government to cancel the 10-percent duty tax. Instead, the health minister went ballistic and threatened to confiscate them all if they weren't claimed.

This situation, in addition to rumors of airport thieves and crooked customs agents, has led thousands of Asian Americans to send masks via UPS, Federal Express or DHL. Few people trust the international post office system. Once, I sent a baby present to my friends in Bangkok, only to have the gift arrive several months after the woman had suffered a miscarriage.

On a different note, I'm invited to two weddings this year. More than half of all the bridesmaids in both weddings live in Hong Kong. As a bridesmaid in one of those weddings I am seriously contemplating the addition of a SARS mask to my bridesmaid ensemble. If you can dye pumps and gloves to match formal dresses, you can certainly dye cloth masks. With the proliferation of supposedly fashionable masks (Hello Kitty still looks childish and inane when sported by adult women), I wouldn't be surprised to find one in champagne-colored silk.

Recently, A-ma (grandmother) has been wearing a thin cloth mask, the same flimsy one she wears to protect her lungs from diesel fumes when she rides on the back of my uncle's moped. Her idea of extra protection is washing the mask every couple of days.

My dad's side of the family, worried about going to the hospital, has managed to get enough SARS masks, according to my cousin in London who is in constant contact with that side of the family. I thought that was a strange precaution until I learned that 90 percent of the SARS victims in Taiwan are hospital workers. Now I worry most of all about my uncle who practices medicine in Kaohsiung, the second largest city in Taiwan.

I ask my hubby to get some SARS masks from the hospital where he works. He thinks SARS is overblown. Globally, maybe it is, but the rub is that Asians in the States can only imagine the worst for our relatives on the other side of the world. We're most fearful of what we don't know enough about.

There is even an Internet joke floating around, warning travelers of SLOPS, Severe Loss of Perspective Syndrome. People are cautioned to stay away from the U.S., Western Europe and Canada and instead visit China.

But the joke points out that nearly 3,000 people die every day from malaria. "Malaria, however, mainly affects only poor people that speak foreign and look funny. Whereas SARS has made at least one English person feel a bit iffy for a couple of days, and is therefore considered much more serious."

When SARS stops popping up in Toronto (oh-so-close to the United States border), I'm sure SARS will hardly make it into the mainstream media, relegated to the list of foreigners' diseases. So, as Asians in the United States wait to see if and how SARS gets controlled, we sit tight and follow the news in our home countries religiously. We anxiously track the spread of SARS from city to city because these are cities we were born in, have family in and would like to go back to visit someday.

Meanwhile, I'm packing up the SARS masks in a nondescript box, and FedExing it to my A-ma's house, No. 7 at the end of the alley off Zhongshan Road.

Helen i-lin Hwang is City Paper’s assistant editor. If you would like to respond to this Slant or have one of your own (850 words), contact Howard Altman, City Paper editor in chief, 123 Chestnut St., third floor, Phila., PA 19106 or e-mail altman@citypaper.net.