Railway authorities in China installed thermal scanners at some train stations to check passengers for fevers and keep the disease from spreading over their vast rail networks.
"The infectious outbreak is our call to arms. Time is lives," said a front-page article in the newspaper Beijing Daily.
The number of SARS deaths worldwide rose yesterday to at least 588.
Scientists credited quarantines for breaking the chain of transmission in Hong Kong.
Chinese University of Hong Kong researchers say the territory's SARS outbreak is losing momentum and should dwindle by next month or July and die out no later than October.
But Singapore, which had hoped to deem itself SARS-free as early as this week, may have suffered a setback amid reports of a new possible outbreak at its largest mental health facility, officials said.
The most recent confirmed SARS case in Singapore was on April 27, and the World Health Organization (WHO) had said it would announce the city-state's outbreak was under control if there were no new cases 20 days after the last reported infection.
The WHO lifted its travel warning against Toronto on April 30 after it decided the city's health authorities had contained the disease sufficiently.
More than 7,500 cases of severe acute respiratory syndrome have been reported worldwide.
In addition to the two fatalities, Hong Kong also reported just nine new cases of the disease yesterday. The territory's new cases have been in the single digits for 11 straight days.
In Beijing, the city government said its economic losses were estimated at 450 million yuan (US$54 million) in the first four months of this year, with arrivals of foreign visitors down some 60 percent.
Rainfall is expected to become more widespread and persistent across central and southern Taiwan over the next few days, with the effects of the weather patterns becoming most prominent between last night and tomorrow, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said yesterday. Independent meteorologist Daniel Wu (吳德榮) said that based on the latest forecast models of the combination of a low-pressure system and southwesterly winds, rainfall and flooding are expected to continue in central and southern Taiwan from today to Sunday. The CWA also warned of flash floods, thunder and lightning, and strong gusts in these areas, as well as landslides and fallen
WAITING GAME: The US has so far only offered a ‘best rate tariff,’ which officials assume is about 15 percent, the same as Japan, a person familiar with the matter said Taiwan and the US have completed “technical consultations” regarding tariffs and a finalized rate is expected to be released soon, Executive Yuan spokeswoman Michelle Lee (李慧芝) told a news conference yesterday, as a 90-day pause on US President Donald Trump’s “reciprocal” tariffs is set to expire today. The two countries have reached a “certain degree of consensus” on issues such as tariffs, nontariff trade barriers, trade facilitation, supply chain resilience and economic security, Lee said. They also discussed opportunities for cooperation, investment and procurement, she said. A joint statement is still being negotiated and would be released once the US government has made
SOUTH CHINA SEA? The Philippine president spoke of adding more classrooms and power plants, while skipping tensions with China over disputed areas Philippine President Ferdinand Marcos Jr yesterday blasted “useless and crumbling” flood control projects in a state of the nation address that focused on domestic issues after a months-long feud with his vice president. Addressing a joint session of congress after days of rain that left at least 31 dead, Marcos repeated his recent warning that the nation faced a climate change-driven “new normal,” while pledging to investigate publicly funded projects that had failed. “Let’s not pretend, the people know that these projects can breed corruption. Kickbacks ... for the boys,” he said, citing houses that were “swept away” by the floods. “Someone has
‘CRUDE’: The potential countermeasure is in response to South Africa renaming Taiwan’s representative offices and the insistence that it move out of Pretoria Taiwan is considering banning exports of semiconductors to South Africa after the latter unilaterally downgraded and changed the names of Taiwan’s two representative offices, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MOFA) said yesterday. On Monday last week, the South African Department of International Relations and Cooperation unilaterally released a statement saying that, as of April 1, the Taipei Liaison Offices in Pretoria and Cape Town had been renamed the “Taipei Commercial Office in Johannesburg” and the “Taipei Commercial Office in Cape Town.” Citing UN General Assembly Resolution 2758, it said that South Africa “recognizes the People’s Republic of China (PRC) as the sole
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