Saturday, May 24, 2003

WHO drops travel advisories for Hong Kong

HONG KONG (AP) - The World Health Organization lifted its SARS-related travel advisories Friday against Hong Kong and the Chinese province of Guangdong, saying the outbreaks are under control there.

Researchers in Hong Kong, meanwhile, said they have found the disease in civet cats - a delicacy eaten by some Chinese.

A U.S. disease investigator was rushed home after developing symptoms of the often-deadly virus on the job in Taiwan.

Five people were feared ill with the virus in Toronto, a little more than a week after the Canadian city was dropped from a list of SARS hotspots.

The new apparent outbreak prompted the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention to tell Americans to take precautions against the SARS virus if they travel to Toronto.

Severe acute respiratory syndrome has spread to more than 8,000 people around the globe, and the death toll stood Friday at 689, the vast majority of them in Asia.

The U.N. health organization said it lifted the travel advisories for Hong Kong and Guangdong because the outbreaks there were under control.

"Guangdong was the first place in the world to have cases of SARS but I am pleased to note that due to the efforts of the local and national health authorities, with support from WHO, the outbreaks in Guangdong and Hong Kong are being contained,'' WHO Director-General Gro Harlem Brundtland said in Geneva.

WHO still advises against all nonessential travel to the Chinese capital, Beijing, and to the regions of Hebei, Inner Mongolia, Shanxi and Tianjin, as well as to Taiwan, because of continuing new transmission of severe acute respiratory syndrome.

Meanwhile, University of Hong Kong researchers said Friday they had successfully isolated a type of coronavirus that causes SARS in an animal called the masked palm civet that appears to have spread it to humans.

Microbiologist Yuen Kwok-yung told reporters the scientists tested a large number of game animals eaten by people in China's Guangdong province and found coronavirus in four of the civet cats.

Civet cats are not true cats, but short-haired mammals with long bodies, short legs, and tails. They resemble small raccoons or weasels.

"Looking at the genetic information, it is highly likely that the virus has been jumping from the civets to humans,'' Dr. Yuen Kwok-yung told a news conference, adding that the cats should be handled and sold under careful monitoring to avoid further outbreaks.

The researchers had previously said SARS came from animals but they had not been sure which kind.

They said they could not rule out the possibility that the civets had been infected by other animals, or vice versa, as the disease spread.

The WHO says it is seeking US$200 million to launch a fund to help Asian nations combat SARS through medical surveillance and analysis.

It also updated its statistics on the number of people who are believed to have contracted SARS on an airplane from 16 to 27, following the receipt of more complete information.

"One flight alone, (Air China 112), which flew from Hong Kong to Beijing on March 15, is now known to have accounted for 22 of the 27 cases,'' WHO said in a statement.

Two were flight attendants and 20 were passengers.

Taiwan reported 55 new SARS cases Friday but no new deaths.

The island's total number of infections is 538 and the death toll is 60. That gives the island the third-highest toll after mainland China and Hong Kong.

The U.S. investigator, from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control, had gone to Taiwan on May 15 to check the country's infection controls, and had visited emergency rooms and intensive-care units at two Taipei hospitals where SARS outbreaks were reported.

This week, he developed a fever and a cough _ common SARS symptoms, U.S. officials said. An ambulance took him Friday to a Taipei airport where he boarded a charter flight to the United States.

In Canada, health officials say they fear that five people in a Toronto hospital may be ill with SARS. All four are in a respiratory isolation ward, two in critical condition.

Health officials, who learned of the cases late Thursday and do not yet know how the people may have been exposed to the disease, said they cannot say for certain if these are the city's first new SARS cases in over a month.

The city last reported a new case of SARS on April 19.

With things returning to normal in China's capital, students are starting to go back to public schools closed at the height of Beijing's SARS crisis.

Students who gather for university entrance tests next month will have to undergo medical checkups to confirm they are free of SARS, a state newspaper said Friday.

Beijing has nearly 2,500 cases of SARS - about half the total on China's mainland, where more than 300 people have died. - AP

To the SARS website

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WHO drops travel advisories for Hong Kong