Taiwan experts on visit to SARS-affected mainland areas: DOH

Three Taiwan public health experts have traveled to mainland China to join their counterparts from other countries in surveying the outbreak of severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS) there, an official said yesterday. Lee Lung-teng, deputy minister of the Department of Health (DOH), said the three Taiwan experts ЎX Ho Mei-hsiang, an associate researcher at the Institute of Biomedical Sciences under Academia Sinica, Wang Li-hsing, deputy director of Tzu Chi Buddhist General Hospital in Hualien, and a scholar whose identity was withheld ЎX have arrived in the southern mainland province of Guangdong to collect first-hand information about the SARS outbreak in the region. The first case of the deadly flu-like respiratory disease emerged in Foshan, Guangdong last November. The SARS virus has since spread to many countries around the world, killing 101 people and infecting around 2,500. The mysterious disease has claimed 53 lives in mainland China alone. Lee said the three Taiwan representatives are versed in viral pathology, infection and epidemiology.