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Metropolis Reality Forums Ť China Confirms SARS Case, Begins Civet Cat Cull &n ť

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   China Confirms SARS Case, Begins Civet Cat Cull &n

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Topic: China Confirms SARS Case, Begins Civet Cat Cull &n (Read 154 times)

Rhune
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China Confirms SARS Case, Begins Civet Cat Cull &n
« on: Jan 5^th, 2004, 10:00am »

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China Confirms SARS Case, Begins Civet Cat Cull
By John Ruwitch

BEIJING (Reuters) - China confirmed on Monday its first SARS case since a world epidemic was declared over in July, and began a mass slaughter of civet cats on fears a new strain of the deadly virus may have jumped from wild animals to humans.

Health officials in the southern province of Guangdong said a virus gene sample from the SARS patient -- a 32-year-old television producer -- resembled that of a coronavirus found in civet cats, a Chinese culinary delicacy.

To eliminate a possible fresh source of the disease, the province where Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome originated in November 2002 planned to close wild animal markets.

"And we will kill all the civet cats in Guangdong markets, which number about 10,000," Guangdong health bureau official Feng Liuxiang told a news conference.

Guangdong also launched a "patriotic health campaign" to exterminate rats and cockroaches ahead of the Chinese Lunar New Year holiday, which starts on January 22, when tens of millions of Chinese travel the country.

Adding to fears around Asia of a new outbreak, the Philippines announced that a maid who had been working in Hong Kong was a suspected SARS case.

She was being held in isolation with her husband and a doctor who initially treated her. Tests results would be available within two days, the health department said.

Two other cases have been reported in Taiwan and Singapore, but both were scientists who had apparently been infected in laboratories.

The SARS epidemic killed about 800 people around the world, including 349 in China. It brought Asian tourism and air industries almost to a halt and devastated the economies of Hong Kong, Taiwan and Singapore.

WHO SEES NO PUBLIC THREAT

The World Health Organization (WHO) confirmed the case and praised Guangdong for how it handled the case. It said the lone case did not constitute a public health threat and would not be grounds for a travel warning for China.

"We do believe that the system in Guangdong was working," WHO representative in China Henk Bekedam told a news conference. "We have, really, thumbs up for what's happened so far."

The Chinese health ministry said in a statement the confirmation of the SARS case followed repeated tests by the Guangdong Center for Disease Control and the China Center for Disease Control and was in line with tests of two laboratories of the World Health Organization.

Seventeen of 81 people known to have had contact with the patient were still being isolated, it added.

The patient told doctors last month he had not left Guangzhou or eaten wild animal meat for a month before hospitalization, and the cause of his infection remained elusive.

Financial analysts warned the news would hit airline and tourism stocks on Tuesday, while providing a lift to drug counters.

"I'm not at all surprised," a Western diplomat said in reaction to the confirmation. "I don't think there will be much impact, as the government has pretty good preventative measures in place following the last outbreak."

CIVET CULL "RADICAL STEP"

Xinhua news agency quoted an unidentified official at the center for diseases control in Guangdong making the connection between the new SARS case and civet cats.

"We should begin the measures to prevent SARS beforehand and ban sales and eating of the animal in a bid to reduce the chance of contracting SARS virus," Xinhua quoted the official as saying.

Guangdong would set up highway inspection stations to keep wild animals from being brought in from other provinces, it said.

The WHO, however, called the cull a "radical step."

"We would recommend that the authorities do take extreme caution with this large thing to be undertaken, and we do feel that there is a potential hazard there," said Jeffrey Gilbert, a WHO expert in diseases communicable from animals to humans.

Witnesses saw police and health officials at markets inspecting cages full of civets and piles of carcasses gathered for destruction.

In Beijing, which became the epicenter of the outbreak last year, residents showed little alarm.

"What is there to be afraid of?" asked Guo Hua, who sells soda and cigarettes at one of Beijing's hole-in-the-wall kiosks.

Some scientists suspect that SARS spread from animals in wild animal markets in China, and the WHO says the civet has been most closely implicated, but noted there was no conclusive evidence.

The Hong Kong Standard newspaper said a waitress had become the second suspected SARS case in Guangdong but provincial officials and hospitals denied the report.

Guangdong's campaign to eliminate pests brought to mind Mao Zedong's campaigns against rats, flies, mosquitoes and sparrows, which he denounced as the four evils.

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MzWings
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Re: China Confirms SARS Case, Begins Civet Cat Cul
« Reply #1 on: Jan 5^th, 2004, 10:48am »

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So I had to Google "civer" since it was a new word to me.

Large Indian civet - VIVERRA ZIBETHA

Class: Animals with Milk Glands (Mammalia)
Subclass: True Mammals (Eutheria)
Order: Meat-eating Mammals (Carnivora)
Family: Viverridae.

http://www.americazoo.com/goto/index/mammals/291.htm

Apparently the Civet cat is a delicacy in that part of the world.

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luci
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Re: China Confirms SARS Case, Begins Civet Cat Cul
« Reply #2 on: Jan 8^th, 2004, 8:12pm »

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OMG!!! That is the most disgusting animal I've ever seen! And they call it a delicacy, no wonder it made them sick!

Some people will eat anything and I'm so close to being a total 100% vegetarian right now!

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