Viragen, Inc. today announced that it has filed a patent application covering the use of natural human leukocyte-derived alpha interferon for the treatment and prevention of severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS).
The World Health Organisation said the SARS outbreak was under control in Hong Kong, the worst-hit area outside mainland China.We think that the outbreak has come under control in Hong Kong and that soon there will be no new cases," WHO's head of communicable diseases, David Heymann, told Hong Kong Cable Television from Geneva in remarks broadcast on Saturday.
Financial Times by Kathrin Hille:
Taiwanese officials and medical experts expect severe acute respiratory syndrome, or Sars, to return periodically even if the current epidemic is brought under control."We are preparing for the worst," said Ma Ying-jeou, mayor of Taipei. "We have to assume Sars will come back next year and we might have fresh outbreaks every winter." Deng Jou-fang, president of the Taiwan International Medical Alliance, echoed this, saying: "Sars is here to stay."
China has an unfortunate history of producing new viral strains, including the microbe behind the latest SARS outbreak. Some virologists believe traditional farming practices in China, where farmers raise ducks, pigs, and fish in one integrated system, may exchange viruses between animals and enable their jump to humans.
GENEVA, SWITZERLAND -- May 14, 2003 -- Health officials in Singapore reported yesterday a cluster of 24 patients and 6 nurses from the Institute of Mental Health who have recently developed fevers. All but one of the patients were from a single ward at the Institute.
New York Times by Erik Eckholm
Only a few months ago, in what already feels like a different era, China's leaders were riding high. No one, neither critics nor partisans of the Communist Party, imagined that a viral disease was about to cause the equivalent of a national train wreck.
Mercury News by Seth Borenstein
Get used to SARS, West Nile, hantavirus, Ebola, Nipah, Hendra, AIDS and other nasty infectious diseases. Health experts say we're living in a new age of infections.And we have mostly ourselves to blame.
The SARS epidemic in the Chinese capital is "under control" because of "effective measures" taken in recent days, Beijing officials told a press conference Tuesday.