| China media downplay danger of flu |
| 2003-03-28 / Associated Press / |
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A day after China disclosed a sharply higher death toll from a mystery respiratory illness, state media played down the danger in sparse reports yesterday that tried to assure the public the disease was contained. Health officials declined to release any new information about the disease that Chinese authorities said Wednesday had killed 34 people by the end of February - three in Beijing and the rest in the southern province of Guangdong. "Atypical pneumonia under control," said a headline in the Beijing Morning Post newspaper above a four-sentence report on page nine that mentioned only the deaths in the Chinese capital. Other newspapers had similarly brief reports, or none at all, while the state television midday news made no mention of the disease. A reporter at the Southern Daily newspaper in the Guangdong provincial capital of Guangzhou said state media had received orders to carry only official statements and avoid independent reporting on the disease. He said newspapers were told to keep reports brief and not to put them on front pages. "They want to focus on one point - that the disease has been brought under control well - and keep other details low profile, in order to avoid public panic," said the reporter, who was contacted by telephone at the newspaper and wouldn't give his name. SARS also has claimed lives in Hong Kong, Vietnam, Canada and Singapore. At least 1,300 people have been sickened. China says its first SARS cases were reported November 16, though authorities didn't disclose them until February. Until Wednesday, the officials had said only five people were dead, and their announcement this week gave no details on when the deaths occurred. Chinese official reluctance to release information earlier fueled a panic in Guangdong and Hong Kong, where people wore surgical masks outdoors and stocked up on antibiotics. People on the street in Beijing said they weren't concerned about the disease, despite rumors about its spread that have been circulating on the Internet and by mobile phone. "What's there to be afraid of? I'm not scared," said Zhao Yu, who was selling fruit outside You'an Hospital, where city health officials said five people were hospitalized with the disease. "If the doctors aren't scared, why should I be? The patients are all inside anyway," Zhao said. Officials of the hospital confirmed that patients were there with SARS but wouldn't give any details. |