SARS screening stations may be dismantled

Meetings will begin at 8 a.m. Thursday at Sault Area Hospital to discuss a possible dismantling of the Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome (SARS) screening stations, President and CEO Manu Malkani said tonight.

Speaking to a meeting of the hospital's directors, Malkani said new directives were received today from the Ontario Ministry of Health allowing further relaxation of SARS precautions.

To get to the meeting at the Plummer Hospital's Riverview Auditorium, directors had to themselves be cleared by the SARS screeners shown in our photograph.

Malkani said significant reductions in SARS restrictions are likely over the next few days, but no one should expect a complete relaxation.

"I don't think it will ever be completely back to the way that things were," he said.

In other hospital news, directors learned tonight that Cheryl Pavoni has been appointed executive director of the Sault Area Hospital Foundation.

Pavoni is an experienced Foundation staffer who has served for several months as acting director of the SAH Foundation.