News & Perspective

(CIDRAP News) – Although primarily associated with lung infection, the coronavirus that causes SARS (severe acute respiratory syndrome) spreads throughout the human body, Canadian researchers have found.

(CIDRAP News) – Researchers in Canada who found hepatitis in ferrets after injecting the animals with an experimental vaccine for SARS (severe acute respiratory syndrome) are urging caution as other investigators develop and test SARS vaccines.

(CIDRAP News) – The World Health Organization's (WHO's) top official in the western Pacific said yesterday that SARS (severe acute respiratory syndrome) cases may return this winter but probably not in large numbers.

"I don't think a large outbreak is likely," Dr. Shigeru Omi, director of the WHO's Western Pacific Regional Office, said in a speech in Hong Kong. Omi was quoted in a WHO news release.

(CIDRAP News) – To guard against SARS (severe acute respiratory syndrome), the Chinese government has banned the killing and cooking of civets, which have been carriers of the SARS virus in southern China, according to news reports yesterday.

(CIDRAP News) – By sifting data from hundreds of SARS (severe acute respiratory syndrome) cases in Hong Kong, researchers there have developed a scoring system for predicting whether a patient with suspicious signs and symptoms has the disease.

(CIDRAP News) – Chinese health authorities have called off emergency measures for SARS (severe acute respiratory syndrome), saying the latest outbreak is under control, according to Xinhua, China's state news agency.

(CIDRAP News) – The World Health Organization says China's latest SARS (severe acute respiratory syndrome) outbreak appears to be contained after nine cases, but its precise origin is still a mystery.

(CIDRAP News) – Five SARS (severe acute respiratory syndrome) patients have been released from Chinese hospitals this week, leaving only two still hospitalized with the disease, according to reports from China.