Taiwan reports four new Sars cases

Taiwan reported four new Sars infections yesterday and the government punished a Taipei hospital responsible for the latest outbreak, which ended three days of zero new infections.

However, Taiwan health officials stressed the cluster of infections at Taipei Municipal Yang Ming Hospital has been brought under control, and applied to the World Health Organisation to remove the island from its travel advisory list.

The Department of Health has confirmed eight probable cases of Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome (Sars) at Yang Ming out of the 19 it has reported in the past three days, raising worries of a relapse after the epidemic had appeared to be fading in Taiwan.

The four latest cases are part of the eight at Yang Ming after two infections were confirmed each on Saturday and Sunday.

Su Ih-jen, director of the Centre for Disease Control, who on Friday had praised the hospital for swiftly adopting Sars prevention measures, reversed his opinion yesterday.

He said the government had fined Yang Ming hospital T$1.5 million (US$43,200) for failing to report its new infections promptly and for sub-standard infection controls.

"It's like when there is a fire in the kitchen, the first thing most people do is not to call the police, but to try to put the fire out. It's unintentional, but still a mistake," a health department official said by telephone.

"We believe things are under control now." Yang Ming's superintendent, Wang Tai-lung, resigned to take responsibility.

Taiwan has the third-worst outbreak of Sars in the world with 680 cases, though the death toll had remained unchanged at 81 people for nearly two weeks.