News on SARS

Beijing Sees Downward Trend in SARS Cases
Beijing saw a "notable downward" trend in SARS cases in late May due to the government's effective disease control and treatment measures, said Cai Fuchao, the city's publicity head on May 24 at the weekly press conference.

The number of SARS patients in the city dropped markedly from May 17 to May 23, with the average confirmed SARS cases decreasing to 13.2 per day. Of the eight foreign SARS patients in Beijing, seven were discharged from hospital after recovery, and one died.

The municipal government is now giving priority to the prevention measures among migrant workers, Cai said. As a large number of such workers are expected to return to the city when spring farming is finished in the rural areas, the city government is making intensified efforts to prevent the spread of SARS among them.

"The municipal government needs to do solid and arduous work to continue efforts to contain the disease as more and more residents whose concern over SARS eases, are again beginning to go shopping and eating in restaurants," said Cai.
The intensified preventive measures are focused on construction sites, schools and communities, as well as among healthy people, he said.

"The joint efforts of all citizens have proved a most important factor for the current achievements in combating SARS in Beijing," added Cai.

'We Need to Rely on Strong Weapon of Science'-Premier
China's National Science Week 2003 opened as scheduled on May 17, its theme being "Defeating SARS with Science." In a letter read to visitors to the opening ceremony, Chinese premier Wen Jiabao said science was a strong weapon in winning the fight against SARS. "We ultimately need to rely on science, major breakthroughs in SARS diagnosis, and treatment and prevention to defeat it," he said.

"We need to rely on science to dispel panic among the people. Scientific thoughts and attitudes will help people to acquire confidence and courage, and help them to get rid of superstitious thoughts and fatuity."

During the week-long event, scientific and technological workers disseminated scientific knowledge and methods of SARS control via the Internet, television, radio and newspapers. State councilor Chen Zhili attended the on-line opening ceremony, an event held annually since 2001.

Huge Daily Growth in Anti-SARS Cash/Kind Donations
Donations to aid the fight against SARS in China are increasing by more than 66 million yuan (about US$7.98 million) each day, the total currently standing at around 1.45 billion yuan ($174.7 million). Of the total, some 882 million yuan ($106.3 million) has been in cash, the remainder in donated relief goods and materials.
Figures from the Ministry of Civil Affairs (MCA), show that donations have mainly been channeled through various levels of the ministry, along with the Ministry of Health, the Chinese Red Cross Society, and the Chinese Charity Federation, each of whom are officially designated as recipients of anti-SARS donations.

Most of the donations have been sent to hospitals responsible for SARS prevention and treatment, including Beijing Xiaotangshan Hospital, and the Sino-Japanese Friendship Hospital. Some have also gone to regions plagued by SARS, such as Hebei, Shanxi and Inner Mongolia. The MCA says it will regularly keep the public informed of further donations.

First SARS-Treatment Drug Approved for Clinical Usage
China's State Food and Drug Administration has approved the clinical use, on a trial basis, of a drug potentially beneficial in the treatment of SARS, reported Xinhua News Agency.

An administration source described the drug, named Sivelestat Sodium, as a "chemical injection" which increases the respiratory capacity of SARS patients, reducing their reliance on respirators and thus greatly reducing the incidence of complications such as infection of the respiratory tract and acute damage to the lungs.

Declining to give details about the drug's developer, the source revealed that the administration has been conducting further tests on the potential effectiveness of the medicine. Earlier, the administration approved the clinical trial usage of two SARS-prevention drugs. In addition, two reagents used in testing for the disease's virus have been authorized to enter batch production.

Drugstores Return to Normal Trading After Panic Buying
Beijing drugstores have returned to their normal pace of business, and continue to provide adequate supplies of anti-SARS medicines. Initially, when SARS first appeared in the city, the stores were almost overwhelmed by customers in a frenzy of panic buying, reported China Daily. Apart from medicines, the most popular buys were face masks and disinfectant.

The paper also reported that Beijing residents are now finding it much easier to cope with the disease, comforted by the efforts made to contain it and the fact that the number of infections seems to be falling.

Cybernet Marriages in Midst of Ravaged 'Golden Season'
The SARS outbreak has prompted many Chinese couples to scrap their traditional wedding gatherings, instead opting to tie the knot in cyberspace. Spring, usually the "golden season" for weddings in Beijing, saw some 90 percent of long-planned wedding parties postponed until later in the year. Some couples, however, simply cancelled their wedding parties and married anyway.

For others, the Internet is proving a convenient place to hold wedding ceremonies during these fraught times. Small ceremonies were held on the net, with live broadcasts on line. Relatives and friends sent their greetings via e-mail, and watched the weddings on their monitors.

Not only wedding celebrations have been affected by the disease. Recruitment fairs have been suspended in most Chinese provinces and regions due to the epidemic, and some graduates have been unable to fulfill interviews, medical examinations or to sign contracts with their new employers.

Meanwhile, the Ministry of Education has called on local administrations to make full use of the Internet and other media sources to publicize job information and to organize online recruitment. An official website offering guidance to graduates will soon be mounted by the ministry.

In Beijing, the communications sector saw a surge in business as residents turned to telephones and the Internet to keep in touch with relatives, friends and other contacts during the initial period of the SARS outbreak. The telephonic business volume in the city rose 60 percent during March compared with the previous month, while long-distance calls increased by 50 percent, said the Beijing Communications Corporation. It noted that Internet services also recorded a 40 percent jump in usage during April, while the demand for tele-conference and telephone meetings has also rapidly increased since the arrival of SARS.

Because they are currently more and more staying indoors, a growing number of residents are asking Internet service providers to open broadband network services to give them easier access to cyberspace. And an increasing number of companies have restricted staff travel, telling them to instead do business by telephone or the Internet. Long-distance telephone calls in Beijing used to peak from 8-10pm. Now the peak has shifted to 9-11am as a direct result of the SARS outbreak.

Combined East-West Medicines Prove Effective
The combined use of traditional Chinese medicine (TCM) and western medicine has proved effective in Guangdong Province, Beijing and many other parts of China, say official sources. By April 24, the No.1 Hospital attached to Guangzhou Traditional Chinese Medicine University had successfully treated all of its 36 SARS patients and kept its medical staff safe from the virus with the help of TCM. As would be expected in China, many people immediately rushed to buy TCM as soon as the epidemic surfaced in Guangdong.

Based on the experiences of Guangdong, the State Administration of TCM has published guidelines for doctors which include a recommendation that TCM can be used to prevent and treat SARS. The guidelines, drawn up by TCM experts in China, separate treatments in combination with western medicines into four stages -early, middle, peak and recovery. Also provided by the administration is a series of different prescriptions for people of differing age and states of health. The results of combined treatments were noted by experts from the WHO when they visited Guangdong.