- TAIPEI (Reuters) - The Taiwan
military scientist recently diagnosed with SARS had stayed at home for
five days, refusing to seek medical help, after realizing he might have
contracted the deadly virus, his father said on Friday.
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- The scientist tested positive for SARS this week and
is now in stable condition. He probably contracted the disease in a laboratory
accident two weeks ago, shortly before he visited Singapore for a seminar.
-
- "My son had refused to go to the hospital and said
he wanted to die at home because he feared his illness would bring shame
to his lab and the country," the scientist's father said on television.
-
- "He finally agreed to go to the hospital after I
threatened to kill myself."
-
- Authorities are monitoring at least 75 people in Singapore
and about 35 in Taiwan who came into contact with him, but none of them
has shown any signs of SARS.
-
- The case has spread alarm in Asia, which bore the brunt
of a virulent outbreak of SARS this year. Worldwide, about 8,000 people
were infected and about 800 died, and many of the region's economies were
battered.
-
- Hong Kong, one of the cities most badly affected by the
disease this year, tested seven elderly women in a hospital ward for SARS
on Friday after they all fell ill with fever. All were found free of the
disease.
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- Only two cases of SARS have been reported since the World
Health Organization declared in July that the outbreak of the disease was
over -- and both have been traced to laboratories.
-
- The other case was of a research student in Singapore
who tested positive for the potentially lethal disease after a laboratory
accident in September.
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- "NO CUTTING CORNERS"
-
- Peter Cordingley, a spokesman for the WHO's Manila-based
Western Pacific headquarters, said his office was "talking with governments
and asking for an inventory" to assess safety and security at laboratories
handling the SARS virus.
-
- "There should be no more cutting corners and procedures
should be followed to the letter," Cordingley told Reuters.
-
- Dr Shigeru Omi, the WHO's regional director, told reporters
on Wednesday there appeared to be lax application of laboratory rules in
the case of the Taiwan scientist.
-
- "Initial information is he was not wearing a proper
gown and lab gear for protection," Omi said. "There were lapses
in WHO procedures."
-
- The 75 people quarantined in Singapore will remain in
confinement at least until midnight on Friday, when a 10-day incubation
period for the disease ends.
-
- Five of them are sick, and have been isolated at Singapore's
Communicable Disease Center since Thursday, but they do not have SARS.
-
- "They have non-SARS symptoms such as diarrhea. Isolating
them was just a precaution. The five were diagnosed as non-SARS,"
said Karen Tan, Health Ministry spokeswoman.
-
- In Taiwan, officials said they were monitoring the health
of the scientist's immediate family, staff at the clinic where he sought
treatment and several passengers who had traveled back with him on a China
Airlines flight from Singapore.
-
- Shih Wen-yi, deputy director-general of Taiwan's Center
for Disease Control, told reporters that all of them had been located except
for two Taiwanese passengers on the flight.
-
- The Taiwan government would hold an inquiry into the
laboratory accident and a report is expected in a few days, officials said.
-
- Additional reporting by Jason Szep in Singapore and Manny
Mogato in Manila
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