SARS update
19 with SARS symptoms quarantined
- Fifty-nine suspected cases of people having symptoms similar to the Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome (SARS) have been reported in Malaysia with 19 people being quarantined in hospitals.
- Scientists have satisfied key tests that confirm that the virus causing the global outbreak of severe pneumonia is a new type of coronavirus. Severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS) has so far struck down more than 2300 people, and killed 78.
The identification will speed up the testing of victims and their contacts to see how the disease spreads, and how it might be contained.
(Thanks to Jeff Ooi)
- The World Health Organisation (WHO) warned travellers on Wednesday to avoid Hong Kong and the southern Chinese province of Guangdong because of the mounting toll from Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome (SARS).
The United Nations body said there was evidence that in Hong Kong that the disease was being spread through environmental systems - possibly through the water or sewage - and not just by close personal contact.
This could increase the rate of infection in an area where visitors had already caught the illness and taken it back home with them.
- The global death toll from Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome jumped yesterday as China broke its silence and admitted it had more cases in more provinces than it had previously revealed.
China said it had 1,190 suspected cases through the end of March, and 46 deaths instead of the 34 it had admitted. Cases were reported in Guangxi, Hunan and Sichuan provinces as well as Guangdong for the first time.