SARS: 4,000 kept in isolation in Beijing health step

As Beijing began a stringent new program of quarantines to halt the spread of severe acute respiratory syndrome, pledging to isolate virus-exposed people and contaminated buildings, reported SARS cases in the capital continued to surge for the fifth straight day.
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One hundred and three more patients were confirmed as of Thursday evening, taking the city’s reported total to 877.
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In the special administrative region of Hong Kong, officials announced Friday that six more people had died after contracting SARS, and 22 new cases of the disease were reported.
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Equally ominous in Beijing, experts said, was the relentless climb in suspected SARS cases in the city, to 954 as of Thursday night, compared with fewer than 700 a few days back. Officials have not said what portion of suspected cases turn out to be SARS. But the parallel rise in numbers indicates that the epidemic is still worsening in Beijing and also spells an overwhelming load for hospitals and medical workers, who must treat all the cases with the same extraordinary precautions.
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In the huge southern city of Shanghai, which has reported only two confirmed and 18 suspected cases of SARS, a team from the World Health Organization said Friday that the statistics appeared to be generally reliable, unlike the finding last week in Beijing of major undercounting.
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Why Shanghai, which is far closer to the SARS epicenter of Guangdong, has had such a light burden is something of a mystery.
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Friday morning, Beijing officials held the first of what they promised would be frequent press briefings on an epidemic that has suddenly become a consuming threat and popular obsession.
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Cai Fuchao, Beijing’s propaganda chief, condemned as pernicious rumors the widely repeated claim that air and road links to the city will be cut or that martial law will be imposed.
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Cai said that hundreds of inspectors are visiting 147 city hospitals to insure that disease reports are accurate. But international health officials complain that Beijing still has not provided details about where the virus has appeared within the city and among what groups – information that is vital for defeating the disease and assessing risks to the general public.
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Only after he was cornered by frustrated reporters did a city health official provide a sketchy picture of quarantines so far. Some 4,000 residents with exposure to SARS patients are in isolation, many of them in their own homes, said Guo Jiyong, deputy director of the Beijing health bureau. It was not clear whether that number included the staff and patients now sequestered in two Beijing hospitals, and officials did not reveal how many apartment blocks, factories or other buildings had been quarantined.
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On Thursday, the city essentially closed down the People’s Hospital of Beijing University after dozens of doctors and nurses inside reportedly showed possible signs of SARS. More than 2,000 employees of the hospital and an unknown number of patients are forbidden to leave as the facilities are decontaminated.
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A second facility, Ditan Hospital, one of the prime hospitals treating SARS patients, was also closed off Friday, for reasons that were not disclosed.
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Nationwide, according to data released Friday evening by the Ministry of Health, China has recorded 2,601 SARS cases, including 115 deaths, with the disease now appearing in 21 provinces and municipalities.
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Singapore rejects quarantine
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Singapore’s health minister, Lim Hng Kiang, on Friday rejected suggestions that people potentially exposed to SARS be quarantined on an island, saying they cannot be compared to lepers, Agence France-Presse reported.