- BEIJING (Reuters) - The World
Health Organisation warned against travel to the Chinese capital and Canada's
main city on Wednesday as authorities in Beijing ordered schools closed
to try to halt the spread of the SARS virus.
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- Beijing is the hardest hit place in China where SARS
is believed to have originated. China has the world's highest death toll
from SARS from the virus with 106 fatalities.
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- Fear about the economic impact was growing with a leading
investment bank predicting China's economy, one of the fastest growing
in the world, was likely to shrink this quarter.
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- The World Trade Organisation said the epidemic would
contribute to a gloomy year with global trade volume expected to increase
by less than three percent after an already poor 2.5 percent rise last
year.
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- The World Health Organisation (WHO) recommended the postponement
of non-essential travel to the Chinese capital, Shanxi province to the
southwest and the Canadian city of Toronto for at least three weeks, twice
the maximum incubation period.
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- On April 4, the U.N. agency warned travelers against
going to the southern Chinese province of Guangdong, where SARS is believed
to have begun, and neighboring Hong Kong.
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- "Today we are making further recommendation in that
we are going to recommend people who have unnecessary travel to Shanxi,
Beijing and to Toronto postpone travel if possible," David Heymann,
director of communicable diseases, told reporters.
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- "As was the case for Hong Kong and Guangdong, we
now have these areas which have a high magnitude of disease, a great risk
of transmission locally and have also been exporting cases to other countries,"
he said.
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- In Canada, the only country outside Asia where people
have died from the disease, the death toll rose to 15. There are now 324
probable or suspected cases, most of them in Toronto.
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- Hong Kong, which also reported more deaths and infections,
announced a $1.5 billion package to help businesses reeling from the impact
of the disease. The city has now had 105 SARS deaths.
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- In Singapore, where there have been 189 infections and
up to 17 deaths, alarm was growing over an outbreak among vendors at the
city-state's largest vegetable market and the government threatened to
jail people violating quarantine.
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- CLASSES CLOSED
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- The illness, whose symptoms include high fever, a dry
cough and difficulty in breathing, has killed more than 250 people around
the world. Most patients survive, but health officials say the mortality
rate has risen from four percent to 5.9 percent and there is no known cure.
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- No one is sure in how many ways it can spread. Droplets
from sneezing and coughing are one way, but there is concern the virus
may also be transmitted by touching objects such as lift buttons and by
fecal matter.
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- China has more than half of the world's more than 4,200
SARS cases and panic has begun surfacing after the government allowed state
media to report fully on the disease.
-
- Beijing, a city of 14 million people, has reported almost
700 cases and 35 deaths. Until last week, officials had admitted to only
37 infections in the city.
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- Beijing authorities ordered all primary and secondary
schools closed for two weeks from Thursday, a move that will affect an
estimated 1.7 million children.
-
- Armies of disinfection squads sprayed down airports and
planes and the government has also shortened its Golden Week holiday in
early May to discourage travel and prevent the spread of SARS. But that
will mean far less spending during one of the country's most popular vacation
times.
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- Investment bank JP Morgan Chase said the shorter holiday
could hit China's growth significantly.
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- In Beijing, travelers lugging suitcases clogged the square
in front of the main railway station in hopes of getting on one of the
dozens of train going to the north, south and west -- anywhere out of the
crowded city.
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- People wearing white cotton masks waited for hours outside
rather than linger in crowded waiting rooms.
-
- "I'm going home because I'm scared of getting sick,"
said migrant worker Deng Pao after managing to buy a ticket to his home
province of Henan. "I've been in Beijing for two months and had a
good job, but it's not worth it."
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