A Chinese doctor has been detained for making a wrong diagnosis of SARS and causing panic at a factory in the southern city of Shenzhen, the Xinhua news agency reported.
It said the man, found practising without a licence, told a woman with a cold she had the flu-like Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome (SARS), which has killed 225 people and infected over 4,000 in 25 countries.
The factory where the woman worked ordered the place disinfected, sparking panic among co-workers, the agency reported. It added the man would be detained for 15 days but did not say whether he would be charged.
Nearly half the world's cases of SARS have occurred in China, many of them in Guangdong province - where the virus first appeared last November.