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The providers of health care bear the brunt of SARS

Health-care providers account for 27 percent of probable cases of SARS in Taiwan, while the youngest and eldest patients were aged six and 90 respectively, according to official tallies released on Friday.

As of noon on Friday, Taiwan had reported 692 probable SARS cases, with 537 recorded in the northern part of the island, 112 in southern areas, 37 in central Taiwan and six in the eastern part, the Center for Disease Control (CDC) said.

Taiwan's SARS outbreaks were mainly characterized by cluster transmissions inside six hospitals -- Taipei Municipal Hoping Hospital, Jenji Hospital, National Taiwan University Hospital, Kaohsiung Chang Gung Memorial Hospital, Kuantu Hospital and Taipei Municipal Yangming Hospital, the center said.

In demographic terms, the 20-29 age group accounted for the lion's share of the probable SARS cases at 18 percent, followed by the 40-49 age group at 17 percent, the 30-39 group at 16 percent, the 70-79 group at 14 percent and the 50-59 group at 13 percent.

The ratios for other age groups fell below 10 percent, the center said, adding that toddlers and teenage probable SARS patients made up only 7 percent of the total.

Chen Kuo-tung (陳國東), a CDC section chief in charge of epidemic monitoring and survey, said the island's youngest SARS patient was a six-year-old child of a CTIC Corp employee. Several of CTIC staff fell victim to the atypical pneumonia after they returned from Beijing -- a SARS hot spot -- in March. The child and all SARS-infected CTIC staff members have recovered from the flu-like disease, Chen said.

Chen said statistics show that gender was irrelevant to SARS susceptibility, with the ratio of male and female patients standing at 1.1 to 1.
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