WHO issues 1st ever-warning against travel to another country

[Guest guest]

I wonder if they'll eventually take blood tests of most travellers. This way

they can build up the DNA base for the Illuminati.

 

> http://story.news./news?

tmpl=story & u=/afp/20030402/wl_afp/health_pneumonia_030402200635

> WHO warns against travel to SARS-hit Hong Kong, Guangdong province

>

> HONG KONG (AFP) - The World Health Organization (WHO) issued an

> unprecedented regional travel warning for Hong Kong and China's

> Guangdong province because of a killer pneumonia virus that has prompted

> a global health crisis.

>

> As the number of deaths from Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome (SARS)

> rose to at least 78, including 12 more in China, the Geneva-based WHO

> also expressed concern that the virus may be more contagious than

> previously believed.

>

>

> In Hong Kong, where the number of new SARS cases rose by just 23

> Wednesday compared to 75 the previous day, the authorities sought to

> play down the WHO travel advisory and claimed to be winning the battle

> against the disease.

>

>

> " We are now at a critical time, but we understand where the illness is

> coming from and how we can defeat this illness, " Hong Kong chief

> executive Tung Chee-hwa told a press conference.

>

>

> Countries around the world began stepping up their efforts meanwhile to

> prevent the spread of SARS -- screening arriving passengers from

> affected areas, placing some in quarantine and even barring them from

> entry in some cases.

>

>

> SARS has been blamed for the deaths of 78 people -- 46 in China, 16 in

> Hong Kong, six in Canada, four in Singapore, four in Vietnam and two in

> Thailand -- and more than 2,300 suspected or confirmed cases have been

> reported in more than 20 countries.

>

>

> The outbreak of SARS is believed to have begun in Guangdong province in

> November, spread to Hong Kong in February and from there to other

> countries through airline passengers.

>

>

> Many governments have already advised their nationals not to visit

> affected areas and David Heymann, head of the WHO's communicable

> diseases unit, announced in Geneva on Wednesday that the UN health

> agency was doing the same.

>

>

> " We've decided to make a recommendation that people who are planning

> travel to both Hong Kong Kong and Guangdong, which is adjacent to Hong

> Kong, consider postponing their travel to another time, " Heymann told

> reporters.

>

>

> The advice does not apply to other areas, such as Singapore, Vietnam and

> Canada, where health authorities appear to be managing to control the

> outbreak of SARS, he said.

>

>

> He said the travel advisory was being issued " because of the fact that

> we don't completely understand the means of transmission in Hong Kong

> and because since March 15, tourists and businessman have returned from

> Hong Kong to their countries with infection. "

>

>

> " This is the first time we've recommended that people avoid an area in

> recent years, it's because we don't understand the disease completely,

> there's no vaccine and no drug, " Heymann said.

>

>

> A WHO spokesman, Dick Thompson, later clarified that it was the first

> time that the WHO had issued a travel advisory " about a specific region

> in response to a communicable disease " since it was founded 55 years

> ago.

>

>

> Britain later mirrored the warning, " strongly " advising its citizens

> against visiting Hong Kong and Guangdong.

>

>

> Heymann said there were indications from Hong Kong that the virus may be

> being spread through the environment and not just close personal contact

> as previously believed.

>

>

> " In Hong Kong transmission does not seem to be only by close contact

> from person to person, it appears that there is something in the

> environment which is serving as a vehicle to transfer the virus from one

> person to another, " the WHO expert said.

>

>

> " We do not believe this is in the air " and could be in the sewage or

> water systems, he said.

>

>

>

>

>

> Canada, grappling with the largest outbreak of SARS outside of Asia,

> reported two more deaths from the disease on Tuesday and said a total of

> 129 probable SARS cases had been detected in Canada, 109 of them in

> Ontario.

>

> China reported 12 new deaths from SARS on Wednesday -- nine in Guangdong

> province and three in the southern region of Guangxi Zhuang -- although

> the country's health minister, in his first public comments since the

> outbreak began, claimed the number of new cases in China was falling.

>

> " In Guangdong at the height of the epidemic there were 60 to 70 new

> cases every day. Today there were fewer than 10, " Zhang Wenkang said on

> the state-run CCTV television network.

>

> The latest figures took the total number of reported cases of SARS in

> China to 1,190, while the 23 new cases in neighboring Hong Kong took the

> total in the territory to 708.

>

> China has come in for criticism for its slow response to the outbreak,

> and Shigeru Omi, director of the Manila-based WHO Western Pacific

> regional office, described China's agreement on Wednesday to allow a WHO

> team to visit Guangdong as a " positive development. "

>

> A WHO team which has been in Beijing for about a week awaiting a green

> light from the Chinese authorities to visit Guangdong is to leave for

> the province on Thursday.

>

> In other developments, Israel and Brazil announced their first suspected

> cases.

>

> Malaysia announced it would temporarily freeze the intake of foreign

> workers from affected countries and Thailand said vistors from countries

> affected by outbreaks must wear masks at all times.

>

> In Switzerland, organizers of the World Watch, Clock and Jewellery Fair

> 2003 in Basel and Zurich banned more than 2,500 traders from China, Hong

> Kong, Singapore and Vietnam from taking part in the fair because of SARS

> fears.

>

>