Beijing struggles to control SARS' spread
Bloomberg News Service
BEIJING — Departing passengers at Beijing's airport, bracing for their temperatures to be taken by infrared scanners publicized on state-run television, stroll past a health checkpoint where four nurses are too preoccupied chatting to notice them.
Associated Press
"There are no machines," said Fadjar Affandy, a Beijing resident heading home to Indonesia. "There's only an embarrassed airline employee asking if anyone has a fever or a cough. Everyone is saying 'no.' "
A man wears a Hello Kitty mask in Beijing to protect himself from SARS. The capital's residents are alarmed by the spread of the virus.
Beijing's reported cases of severe acute respiratory syndrome surged twentyfold to 877 in the week since the city's mayor was fired for covering up the spread of the disease. The city's authorities have issued a flurry of decrees, some of which have triggered unintended reactions from the public, while others have been ignored.
The capital's schools, for instance, were closed for two weeks, causing many out-of-town teachers and students to head for the railway stations and other transport hubs. Two days later, city authorities reversed course, ordering teachers and students not to leave town.
Authorities also demanded taxis be disinfected every day. The result: many cabbies slap "sterilized" stickers on their windshields without giving any indication when the vehicle was disinfected.
"The controls in Beijing are not so strict," said Tobias Franke, an engineer for Siemens AG returning to Beijing from South Korea. "When I arrived in Korea, people checked my temperature. They didn't here. They didn't even collect my health form that I filled out on the airplane."
Strict rules and lax enforcement are doing little to contain rising alarm among Beijingers. While the government-owned Beijing Morning Post was hailing "no crisis of trust" in the city, residents were stripping store shelves of soy sauce, instant noodles and cooking oil as citizens bet businesses will close and distribution networks might break down.
Whole buildings are being threatened with quarantine sometimes on only the vaguest suggestion that a SARS victim might live there. Some foreign residents at Soho China Ltd.'s residential and office complex in eastern Beijing were left in confusion about whether they might be grounded after a SARS case was confirmed in one of their buildings.
"Some of the officials in Beijing are overreacting," said Wolfgang Preiser, a medical virologist and a member of the World Health Organization's team of doctors investigating SARS in China. "Panic never helps because it makes people react without thinking. The panic now in Beijing is the result of all the underreporting, which suddenly turned to a large number."
The government, trying to quash rampant rumors that the city was about to be sealed off, held a news briefing yesterday to insist that martial law won't be imposed. The city of 13 million is home to more than 100,000 foreign expatriates, 50,000 foreign students and millions of migrant laborers.
"Policies taken by the government are to quarantine and isolate infected areas," said Cai Fuchao, head of the city's publicity department. Imposing martial law is "impossible," he said.
Still, the exodus continues. Korean Air and Asiana Airlines, South Korea's two largest carriers, will add more flights between Beijing and Seoul to help its nationals return home. Chinese people are also exiting the capital.
"Everyone is scared here," said Chen Xi, who works for a Shanghai real-estate company and is returning to her home province. "Beijingers are spreading too many rumors, and the government isn't telling the truth."
A Xinhua news agency report calling for the state media to "help boost public morale" won't add to public confidence that they are getting the real picture.
China needed to promote the national spirit more than ever in the fight against SARS, Xinhua cited senior leader Li Changchun as telling media organization chiefs.
A cursory count at Beijing's main railway station found about 50 people boarding each departing train. There are no health checks even after the government last week ordered them.
"I'm going back home to Shandong (province) because it doesn't have SARS," said Liu Zhidong, who works in a Beijing hotel.
The city in turmoil has produced its own new brand of entrepreneurs. Wang Hong is hawking surgical masks decorated with Hello Kitty felines and Doraemon catlike robots for 2 yuan (24 cents). He also has the standard white variety.
"I bought these wholesale from the hospital," Wang said. "Stores don't have them anymore."
