Larry, the fact that insurers wouldn't cover employees who might have contracted SARS in Toronto SHOULD mean that no one from the USA travel anywhere ever again.
BTW, thousands of Toronto area people have been in the USA, every day of the week for the past 2 months, just like there are all the time, every day of the year...chances are, anyone traveling anywhere may have been on a plane, or in a restaurant or office, with a Toronto Person.
Let's face it, the majority of US corporations buy the cheapest HMO coverage possible, and these plans like to exempt virtually everything they can from coverage.
A blanket disclaimer like this has them rubbing their hands together. They will harass and delay non-SARS cases over this.
HMO's are not about illness or disease, they're about profit.
Even if the convention & show were last week, there was virtually no risk to visitors to Toronto, as long as they stayed away from the designated hospitals/ schools. How hard would that have been ?
Playboy is in town this week, shooting pictures of centerfold hopefuls...for the camera work they have to use an ex-pat Canadian who isn't afraid of the city....( I emailed them that I'm not afraid either . )
The biggest threat to us ALL this year is West Nile Virus, which made it's way into Canada via the USA. The disease-carrying mosquitos do not concern themselves with quarantines, they don't stop at border checkpoints, or answer questions...and they NEVER cancel their meeting or conventions. But even this disease will be blown out of proportion by a frenzied media, and lapped up by the naively underinformed.
regards / Mike