I had the same thing happen to me here in the states during the whole SARS epidemic. I was working in the pediatric emergency department during the winter flu/bronchiolitis/upper respiratory tract infection season. Wait times to be seen were through the roof (more than 3 hours), but most of these kids have viral illnesses anyway, for which we actually do very little. We had a mother bring her child in and told us that the family had just flown back from holiday in southeast Asia and that she was worried about SARS. Naturally they got rushed back and put into isolation. Once they were in the room the parent said that the story wasn't true - that she just didn't want to wait. Most wanted to kick her out of the ED. I felt that a more fitting punishment would've been to call the state department of health which had actually allowed for quarantine of SARS exposures, and had this family quarantined for 7-10 days based on their initial statement indicating exposure.