A World Health organisation expert said yesterday the course of the SARS virus appeared to be slowing at its source in southern China, while Hong Kong reported a spate of new cases of the mystery virus that has caused a global health scare.
Two more people died in Singapore of Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome (SARS), state media said yesterday, days after the city-state showed signs of success of subduing the virus that has killed at least 90 people worldwide and infected more than 2,600.
The Hong Kong government said SARS had infected 41 more people, bringing the number of cases to 883, and hospitals were bracing for a possible tripling of cases.
The pneumonia-like disease, which originated in China's Guangdong province, hit neighbouring Hong Kong in March and has been spread around the world by air travellers.
Dr Robert Breiman, head of a World Health Organisation team investigating the outbreak in Guangdong, said yesterday the number of SARS cases was slowing in the province and the virus was showing signs it might be weakening.
"It does look like the disease rates are dropping - dropping quite a bit," he said.
"The problem isn't extinguished, which would be the nice place to get to. But it's occurring in lower frequency, lower incidence than it was during the peak time in February," he said.
"We're still not ruling out the possibility that the virus itself could become burned out and become less and less transmittable," Dr Breiman said.
Some experts have suggested the SARS virus came from animals and mutated, then jumped to humans, but the team in Guangdong saw no evidence supporting that theory, he said.
Australia has added SARS to a list of diseases requiring quarantine, ranking it as dangerous as cholera and smallpox.
The virus has skirted Europe but Belgium's health ministry said yesterday it was looking into a possible case after a 56-year-old woman was hospitalised with symptoms of the disease in the port city of Antwerp over the weekend.
In Singapore, where eight people have died and which has the world's fourth-highest number of cases, is battling to control SARS from spreading to its main hospital.
A doctor at Singapore General Hospital was confirmed to be infected, raising fears of a crack in the government's strategy of isolating infected people.
Twenty nurses at the hospital are also suspected of having the SARS virus and have been isolated.
The fresh outbreak came after the government imposed strict control measures, placing more than 1,000 under home quarantine and closing schools.
Chinese leader Mr Wen Jiabao, whose government is grappling with its first big crisis since taking office in March, said China could control the spread of SARS and welcomed visitors.
Few are likely to heed the assurance. Some foreign health experts in Beijing believe cases there have gone unreported.
SARS symptoms include high fever, chills and breathing difficulties, and the disease has a mortality rate of about 4 per cent, roughly the same as measles.
By comparison, tens of thousands die every year in the United States from various strains of influenza.