To protect your health, and the health of others, the following precautions are necessary :

• Remain at home in isolation for 10 days after your last exposure. Do not leave your house, and do not have anyone visit you at home.
• Spend as little time as possible in the same room as other people in your home.
• Avoid any direct contact with others in your home.
• Wear a mask any time you are in the same room as another member of your household. Change your mask according to manufacturer instructions. Family members do not have to wear a mask.
• If you have to help small children, wash your hands, wear a mask and consider wearing gloves as an extra precaution.
• Do not share personal items, such as towels, drinking cups, cutlery, toothbrushes, telephones (clean receiver after use if you must share), etc.
• Wash your hands frequently during the day.
• Sleep in a separate room from other members of your home. If this is not possible, sleep as far apart as possible.
• Measure your temperature with your own thermometer twice a day over the 10-day period.
• Family members, of healthy people who are in isolation, do not need to stay home because there is no risk they can transmit SARS.

If you are in isolation and begin to develop symptoms, such as a fever (over 38° C/100.4° F), respiratory symptoms (cough, shortness of breath, difficulty breathing), headache, or simply feeling unwell, you should immediately :

• Call your doctor and/or Telehealth Ontario at 1-866-797-0000 (TTY 1-866-797-0007) where you will be advised how to seek medical attention.
• If you need help with emergency supplies or to arrange food to be transported to your door while in isolation, call your local public health unit.

If you become ill, everyone in the house must stay at home in isolation for a period of time at least 10 days from when symptoms began. If someone else in your family becomes ill, everyone must remain isolated at home for 10 days from the time the last family member began showing symptoms. This must be done to ensure household members do not reinfect each other before resuming normal contact outside the house.

At all times, please remember that SARS is believed to spread from coughing and sneezing, or from direct contact with an ill person. Please follow the guidelines above, washing your hands frequently and wear a mask whenever you are around others at home.

We realize any kind of isolation, particularly an extended isolation, is a tremendous hardship for a household. Please know you are playing a vital role in Ontario's response to SARS, and helping all of us to bring this virus under control.

See also :

• Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome (SARS)
• Who should be in isolation at home?
• SARS Questions and Answers
• SARS Assessment Clinics
• Preventing The Spread of SARS During Faith-Based Practices

March 2003