Toronto fears fresh Sars outbreak

Hundreds of people have been advised to go into quarantine after health chiefs announced a new cluster of 20 or more possible Sars cases in Toronto.

The new scare came hours after the US Centres for Disease Control reinstated a travel alert for Canada's largest city.

Meanwhile, the World Health Organisation lifted its travel advisories related to the severe acute respiratory syndrome (Sars) against Hong Kong and the Chinese province of Guangdong, saying the outbreaks are under control there.

In Taiwan, a US disease investigator was rushed home after developing symptoms of the often-deadly virus on the job.

Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome has spread to more than 8,000 people around the globe, and the death toll stood yesterday at 689, the vast majority of them in Asia.

In Canada, the latest disclosures last night were a harsh blow for Toronto, which was removed from the WHO's list of Sars-affected areas last week after apparently snuffing out the biggest outbreak of the illness outside Asia.

Casualty units throughout the city have now been put under special restrictions that limit access, hundreds of people have been advised to go into a 10-day quarantine in case they were exposed, and Toronto has again become a Sars pariah in the eyes of the world.

Meanwhile researchers have said they have found the Sars virus in civet cats - a delicacy eaten by some Chinese - as the World Health Organisation lifted its travel advisories against Hong Kong and the Chinese province of Guangdong.

WHO, the United Nations health organisation, said it lifted the travel advisories for Hong Kong and Guangdong because the outbreaks there were under control.

But the WHO still advises against all non-essential travel to the Chinese capital, Beijing, and to the regions of Hebei, Inner Mongolia, Shanxi and Tianjin, as well as to Taiwan, because of continuing new transmission of Sars.

Meanwhile, University of Hong Kong researchers said yesterday they had successfully isolated a type of coronavirus that caused Sars in an animal called the masked palm civet that appears to have spread it to humans.

Microbiologist Yuen Kwok-yung told reporters the scientists tested a large number of game animals eaten by people in China's Guangdong province and found coronavirus in four of the civet cats. Civet cats are not true cats, but short-haired mammals with long bodies, short legs, and tails. They resemble small raccoons or weasels.

"Looking at the genetic information, it is highly likely that the virus has been jumping from the civets to humans," Dr Yuen Kwok-yung told a news conference, adding that the cats should be handled and sold under careful monitoring to avoid further outbreaks.

The researchers had previously said Sars came from animals but they had not been sure which kind. They said they could not rule out the possibility that the civets had been infected by other animals, or vice versa, as the disease spread.