The crisis could damage the Minister's reputation, writes Mark Hennessy, Political Correspondent.
Last night's announcement that the Chinese woman suspected of carrying SARS is not, after all, infected will come as good news for the Minister for Health.
It buys Mr Martin time to prepare Ireland for an illness that is causing panic, even though its casualty figures are tiny by comparison with an influenza epidemic.
So far, Mr Martin and his key staff's communication with the public has been nothing short of inept. The public can smell fear from a thousand paces, even if it does not understand why it should be afraid. It must be assured someone is on watch.
Should we be calm? Should we be scared? By word and action, a Minister can play a nation's mood, even if he can never control the crisis that has caused it.
People will listen to figures of authority, as was evident during the foot-and-mouth crisis, if they are convinced there is a plan and it is being followed.
The abiding image from that time was of people earnestly cleaning their boots on mats before entering pubs, shops, and airports. In reality, the mats achieved very little, according to a private review conducted by the Department of Agriculture and Food and its Northern Irish equivalent. However, they persuaded people a crisis existed, and brought urban and rural people together in a way that had not been achieved for decades.
"They made sure that everybody knew that they had to play their part. But it was the precautions taken on farms that actually stopped FMD," said one source.
So far, Mr Martin has not produced a plan. Indeed, he made it worse by appearing on every programme that went on air from Sunday night without one.
Department officials worked for weeks to produce an emergency plan, he said. The hospitals were told. Telephone numbers were handed out, he said.
If they were, the message failed to strike home - so much so that the Department of Health was not told until Monday about the Chinese woman's presence in hospital three days before.
Certainly, the industrial action of 300 public health doctors is more than a bad stroke of luck. And the Minister has not been helped by St Vincent's Hospital's decision to discharge the woman, complete with mask. No doubt the hospital will defend it, but its action seems bizarre.
He can do little about clinical decisions. But he must do something about the strike. Public health doctors can justly complain they have been the Cinderellas of the medical system for years. But now is not the time for industrial action. The Minister must cajole them into returning, or demand they do so. If they refuse, the responsibility should be laid firmly at the Irish Medical Organisation's door.
The calls for the Minister's head have already started. However, he is not at that point, yet. Potentially, though, he faces a tougher task than the Minister for Agriculture, Mr Walsh did, in the foot-and-mouth crisis.
SARS is not foot-and-mouth. Animal movements can be halted, if with difficulty. In a globalised world, people cannot. So far, Mr Martin has not inspired confidence. He must begin to do so.