Singapore Reports a SARS Case at Odds With W.H.O. Definition

Singapore Reports a SARS Case at Odds With W.H.O. Definition
By JANE PERLEZ


SINGAPORE, Sept. 9 — The Singapore Health Ministry confirmed today that a 27-year-old postdoctoral researcher who worked in two of the city's medical laboratories had SARS, the first new case reported since the World Health Organization said in July that the highly contagious disease had been contained worldwide.

The case was discovered two months before the onset of the Northern Hemisphere winter, the season in which the medical community expected that the disease might recur. The acting health minister, Khaw Boon Wan, said at a news conference here that the case represented a "low public health risk." He said he was confident that the case did not represent a new outbreak of SARS because the patient's symptoms had been "picked up early" and he had been "isolated early."

Dr. Khaw said that 25 people who had been in contact with the researcher — including eight people at the Singapore General Hospital and eight family members — had been ordered quarantined. He emphasized that he had decided to confirm the man's illness as SARS, even though it did not meet the World Health Organization's definition.

http://www.nytimes.com/2003/09/10/health/10SARS.html