BEIJING - Medical investigators scrutinized an apartment complex's sewage, water and garbage systems yesterday, trying to track down the source of China's first SARS case of the season, even as reports of another suspected victim emerged.
Meanwhile, the province of Guangdong, where the confirmed and the suspected cases are all located, turned its attention from the slaughter of civet cats - a wild animal that is eaten as a local delicay but is thought to be a means of transmitting SARS - to eradicating a more reviled form of vermin: rats.
The new suspected case was a 35-year-old man in Guangdong, who has been isolated and hospitalized in stable condition, said Dr. Thomas Tsang, a consultant attached to the Department of Health in Hong Kong. He said officials in neighboring Guangdong had informed Hong Kong of the possible case.
The new suspected patient of severe acute respiratory syndrome does not work in a job that involves handling wild animals, which are thought to be a means of transmission for the virus, Tsang said.
But China's Health Ministry informed the World Health Organization last night that tests so far on the man are inconclusive, WHO said. They have not classified him as a suspected SARS case
spokesman Bob Dietz said in Beijing.
Press reports keep bubbling up Dietz said. There's always been a problem with... actually identifying a case. So we want to understand clearly the basics that Guangdong is using.
While information about SARS cases has emerged from several different sources in recent days, the apparently contradictory information that emerged from Hong Kong and Beijing yesterday suggested a communications gap between provincial and national health officials.
Last week, the central government announced the other suspected case, a 20-year-old waitress who worked where civet cats and other wild animals were served. She has been isolated for treatment and is said to be doing well.
The only confirmed case of the season, a 32-year-old producer named Luo, left the hospital last week and was pronounced recovered. He told authorities he came into contact with no wild animals, making the source of his SARS a mystery.
Yesterday, investigators swept through his apartment block in Guangzhou, Guangdong's provincial capital, interviewing managers and looking for sources of infection in water systems, garbage facilities and living quarters. They took swab samples from stairwells and terraces, among other sites.
Based on the observations they made the complex seemed to be managed pretty well
WHO spokesman Roy Wadia said.
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A Chinese man stands near a poster in Beijing warning against the danger of spreading disease from spitting yesterday. Authorities have stepped up measures to prevent another outbreak of the SARS virus in China as new cases arise in the southern province.
