Travelers wearing white masks thronged Beijing's railway stations yesterday, desperate to flee the Chinese capital as the country's death toll from severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS) rose above 100 and became the highest in the world.
The government ordered schools closed to control the soaring numbers of infections and deaths in Beijing while a leading investment bank predicted China's economy, one of the fastest growing in the world, would likely shrink this quarter.
Hong Kong, which also reported more deaths and infections, announced a US$1.5 billion package to help businesses reeling from the impact of the disease. The city has now had 105 fatalities from SARS; China has 106.
In Singapore, alarm was growing over an outbreak of SARS among vendors at the city-state's largest vegetable market and the government threatened to jail people violating quarantine.
Most patients in Singapore so far have been doctors and nurses treating those who had contracted the disease overseas, so the outbreak in the general community was worrying.
In China, which has more than half of the world's known 4,500 SARS cases, an undercurrent of panic was surfacing after the government allowed state media to report fully on the disease.
Hundreds of travellers lugging suitcases clogged the square in front of Beijing Railway Station in hopes of getting on one of the dozens of trains going to the north, south and west -- anywhere out of the crowded city.
"I'm going home because I'm scared of getting sick," said migrant worker Deng Pao after managing to buy a ticket to his home province of Henan.
"I've been in Beijing for two months and had a good job, but it's not worth it," he said.
The city of 14 million people has reported almost 700 SARS cases and 35 deaths, out of 106 nationwide. Until last week, officials had admitted to only 37 infections in the city.
Yesterday alone, authorities said 105 of the 147 new cases nationwide and seven of the nine fatalities were in Beijing.
At the city's railway stations, a sea of people wearing white cotton masks waited for hours outside in the open, chilly air rather than linger in crowded waiting rooms.
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