China: China, where the government has admitted the number of SARS cases in Beijing is far higher than disclosed previously, may be facing a very big outbreak in its provinces, the World Health Organisation has warned.
"If you do not have the resources to deal with SARS, I think we're going for a very big outbreak in China," Mr Henk Bekedam, the WHO representative in China, said yesterday.
"I think it will be quite a challenge to contain SARS within China, especially those provinces which have very limited resources," he said.
"We hope that the provinces will be ready," he added. "Otherwise you might have in all the provinces at least 100 cases, and then you can make up the arithmetic."
The Chinese government admitted yesterday there had been 13 more deaths and 194 new cases since Friday. This brought the total number of fatalities to 92. It has also admitted its healthcare system is poor in rural areas, where 70 per cent of its 1.3 billion people live. The number of deaths in Hong Kong has risen to 94, the highest of any state in the world.
Premier Wen Jiabao, in a speech made last week but published yesterday, said the system was so inadequate that an epidemic could spread "before we know it" and "the consequences could be too dreadful to contemplate".
SARS cases have now appeared in various parts of China, including the northern region of Inner Mongolia, the eastern province of Zhejiang and Guangdong and Guangxi in the south.
A day after the government said Beijing had under-reported its numbers dramatically - raising the the total of cases tenfold to 339 - Mr Bekedam also said the Chinese capital could have many more SARS victims in its hospitals. The WHO believed half the 402 cases the Beijing authorities classify as suspected SARS could be real cases, he said.
The disease, which has killed more than 209 people and infected nearly 3,900 in 25 countries, is spreading, with the Philippines saying it may have suffered its first case, a nurse home on holiday.
She had come from Canada, the only country outside Asia where people have died of SARS since it appeared in China's Guangdong province in November.
Canadian health authorities have warned travellers on a suburban commuter train might have been exposed to SARS, raising fears that the virus could have spread beyond the medical community that has borne the brunt of the illness so far in the country.
A healthcare worker ignored advice to stay home because of possible SARS symptoms and attended a weekend funeral, putting hundreds of people at risk, Canadian health officials admitted yesterday.
Toronto is the epicentre of the biggest outbreak outside Asia, where the disease originated, with more than 250 probable or suspected cases and 14 deaths.
The Easter weekend was considered a major test of containment efforts because of the large number of family gatherings and people attending church services.
Singapore, which with 184 cases and 14 deaths has the world's fourth-highest number of victims, has quarantined up to 2,400 workers at a huge food market because three people who worked there contracted the virus.
Three more people have been diagnosed as suffering from SARS in India, following the first confirmed case last week, Maharashtra state said yesterday.
- (Reuters, AFP, AP)