MSNBC/Associated Press 1/7/04: as China reports second suspected SARS case, civet killing continues, rats are targeted, cages of dogs at food market are only disinfected

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http://msnbc.msn.com/id/3899652/

 

 

Kin Cheung / Reuters

A worker sprays disinfectant on a cage full of

dogs Wednesday at a food market in Guangzhou, the

capital of China's Guangdong province.

 

China reports second suspected SARS case

TV producer patient leaves hospital

 

Kin Cheung / Reuters

A worker sprays disinfectant on a cage full of

dogs Wednesday at a food market in Guangzhou, the

capital of China's Guangdong province.

 

The Associated Press

Updated: 10:07 p.m. ET Jan. 07, 2004

 

GUANGZHOU, China - China reported a second

suspected case of SARS on Thursday, even as the

country's first confirmed SARS patient of the

season was released from the hospital. The

one-sentence announcement by the official Xinhua

News Agency only said that a waitress

hospitalized in China's southern city of

Guangzhou was suspected of having the ailment.

Phone calls to health authorities in Guangzhou on

Thursday weren't answered. A spokesman in Beijing

for the World Health Organization, Roy Wadia,

said he didn't immediately have any more

information on the waitress's case.

 

In Guangzhou on Wednesday, animal merchants

watched aghast as government SARS fighters

descended on China's largest wildlife market and

hauled off bagfuls of squirming civet cats for

slaughter.

 

" Restaurants won't want to buy from here

anymore, " said Liu Qiu, an animal seller. " We do

disinfect here, but outsiders will think it's

full of deadly diseases. ... It might even affect

China's international trade. "

 

Next target: Rats

The aggressive fight against suspected causes of

SARS in the southern city of Guangzhou has just

begun. The government plans to kill all 10,000

civet cats in the area by Saturday, then move on

to the next target: rats.

 

" Guangzhou's carpet extermination of rats, " said

a headline in the newspaper Information Daily,

reporting on the coming three-day campaign. " The

whole city united will go about killing rats, not

leaving out one household. "

 

Given the suspected link between wild animals in

Guangdong and the SARS virus that killed 774

people worldwide last year, city officials say

" extraordinary measures " are needed.

 

The civet, a weasel-like animal prized as a

delicacy, is no longer on the city's menus after

researchers found similarities between a virus

found in the animals and in Guangzhou's SARS

patient. Civets still in markets will be seized

and killed by drowning or electrocution, their

remains boiled into watery mist or burned.

 

But while the intended effect is to make people

feel safer, some merchants at the Xinyuan wild

animal market reacted with alarm and dismay.

 

" There's only one case of SARS, so why is it

necessary to kill all the civets? " said one

animal market worker, a 27-year-old native of

Sichuan province who refused to give his name.

 

" If civets are the suspected cause, it's better

to quarantine and inspect them and then decide

which ones have the disease and kill those, " he

said. " Now, people won't even want to come here

to buy chickens or ducks. "

 

As he spoke, men in white-and-blue jumpsuits

threw sackfuls of civets into a truck. When one

civet jumped out, a worker grabbed it by the neck

with heavy tongs while another hit it in the head

with a metal rod.

 

SARS didn't originate in the animal market,

merchants insisted. " Experts say the excrement

may be a cause of SARS, but they're not sure, "

said Liu, who once sold civets but now

concentrates on rabbits. " They should confirm

this question first. "

 

Restaurant supply manager Huang Zhaoze, buying

chickens, said better sanitation would be good

for the industry. " Fundamentally there is no

problem with these markets, although they are

dirty and have a bad smell, " he said. " As soon as

I go home, I immediately wash my hands. You have

to take care of your personal hygiene. "

 

Roy Wadia, a World Health Organization spokesman

in Beijing, noted that WHO experts who are

searching for the possible source of the

confirmed Guangzhou patient's infection are

examining rats from his apartment building. " But

as to any confirmed links, there are none yet, "

he said.

 

Guangzhou holds an annual rat-killing drive, a

Guangzhou Health Bureau spokesman said, but this

year, " the second goal is to prevent the spread

of SARS. "

 

Newspapers warned the public to take precautions against infection.

 

" While killing rats, you must wear disinfected

gloves, " said the newspaper Guangzhou Daily. An

illustration showed a gloved man plunging a cage

full of rats into a bucket of water.

 

© 2003 The Associated Press. All rights reserved.

This material may not be published, broadcast,

rewritten or redistributed.

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