I think the SARS rate was closer to 8-10%.
Bird flu has consistantly been above 50%
Before the SARS scare, SARS was merely an acronym for Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome with no known etiology or epidemiology; after a spate of cases began to be announced the whole language changed until now we look at SARS as a disease caused by a discrete pathogen.
Now it's almost as bad as when the CDC gave the Gay Flu the more clinical sounding name of AIDS and an enormously and famously popular diet candy went bankrupt shortly thereafter and everybody started rooting for the virus as though their very careers depended on it.