Second SARS Case Suspected in Guangzhou

GUANGZHOU, China, January 9, 2004 (ENS) - Health authorities suspect that a second person has come down with severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS) in this southern province where the disease first emerged last year. The patient, who has been treated under isolation since December 31, 2003, is a 20 year old waitress from Henan province who works at a restaurant in Guangzhou, the capital city of Guangdong province.

She was diagnosed as a suspected case following review by a panel of Chinese SARS experts. Epidemiological investigations and laboratory tests are under way, and the patient is said to be in stable condition.

Some 100 people that she contacted have been traced and placed under medical observation. To date, no signs or symptoms of SARS have developed in any of these contacts.

The announcement follows Monday’s laboratory confirmation of SARS in a 32 year old male television producer who is a resident of Guangzhou. The man has fully recovered and has been discharged from hospital. All close contacts of the patient, including health care workers, have remained in good health throughout the observation period, which has now ended.

At present, no evidence has linked the confirmed case with the suspected case. The possible source of exposure in both cases is under investigation by a 10 member joint team of WHO and Chinese experts who arrived in Guangdong Thursday.

Over the next few days and weeks, parallel investigations will look at possible human-to-human, animal-to-human, and environmental sources of SARS transmission.

Animal experts will also examine conditions surrounding the culling of masked palm civets cats and other wildlife species, and make recommendations for research that could shed light on the origins of the SARS coronavirus. Civet cats, weasel-like animals which are eaten in Guangzhou wildlife restaurants, are thought to be reservoirs of the SARS coronavirus.

The television producer, surnamed Luo, said Tuesday in an interview with the state news agency Xinhua that he had never touched or eaten civet cats in his life.

Guangdong has targeted 10,000 civet cats for slaughter by Saturday – by drowning, electrocution or incineration – as part of its battle against the spread of the SARS virus, although the civets are listed as a national grade-two protected animal in China.

But animal welfare organizations and individuals from French film legend and animal rights campaigner Brigitte Bardot to the International Fund for Animal Welfare (IFAW) are objecting to the culling of the civet cats.

IFAW has called instead for a permanent elimination of all wildlife meat trading across the country by updating China’s wildlife protection laws.

“These markets pose a huge threat to both people and animals,” said Dr. Aster Zhang, director of IFAW’s China office. “Scientific findings prove that when wild animals are kept in captivity their immune systems break down easier and the viruses hosted in their bodies mutate. When humans buy these animals at the market and eat them, the chance for infection is very high.”

The SARS virus, which first emerged in Guangdong in mid-November 2002, is thought to have jumped to humans from some unidentified animal or environmental reservoir.

WHO has not blamed civet cats for spreading the disease, and says further research is urgently needed to determine sources of human exposure, including the possible involvement of a specific animal species.

The World Health Organization (WHO) China office said in Beijing Friday that the second suspected SARS case should be taken seriously. "Working from the incomplete data we have, it seems to us that there is sufficient evidence to indicate that further laboratory tests should be performed, and that this case should be taken seriously," the WHO China office said in a statement Friday night.

It is unlikely that SARS will pose a widespread public health threat, the international agency said. "While the WHO does not want to downplay the seriousness of the situation in Guangzhou or Guangdong Province or the rest of China, we hasten to point out that so far there has only been one confirmed case and one suspected case of SARS this time in a nation of more than 1.3 billion people," it said.

Experience last year showed that the SARS epidemic can be contained and controlled if cases are quickly identified and isolated, and if proper infection control measures are maintained in hospitals, WHO China said in an attempt to stave off public anxiety.

Symptoms of SARS mimic those of several other respiratory diseases, including many that are more frequently seen during the winter months, WHO stressed, saying it is likely that numerous other suspected cases will be reported in coming weeks.