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Health authorities decided yesterday to take yet another throat secretion sample from a man who visited Beijing last week and developed a fever upon returning to Taiwan to confirm that he has not been infected with the severe acute respiratory syndrome virus.

This is the third time that a throat secretion sample from the researcher who works at a private Taiwan biotechnology company is tested for SARS since his return Saturday evening. The first two tests were negative.

The researcher, surnamed Hung, has been quarantined and put under observation at a Taoyuan hospital since he was discovered to have a temperature higher than 38 degrees Celsius Saturday evening upon returning from his week-long visit to Beijing.

Shih Wen-yi (¬I¤å»ö), deputy director-general of the Center for Disease Control under the Department of Health, said yesterday that the researcher will be allowed to leave the hospital and go home if his temperature remains normal, he shows no other SARS-related symptoms, and he tests negative for the SARS virus. The results of the third test are expected to come out after 4 p.m., according to Shih.

The reason Hung is being tested three times is that previous cases have shown that SARS symptoms sometimes resurface after a person's temperature returns to normal and the person is declared SARS free, said CDC Director-General Su Ih-jen (Ä¬¯q¤¯) during a press conference held Sunday.

While in Beijing between April 19-24, Hung visited a lab where one of the latest SARS cases in China had been reported. His case has drawn much attention from Taiwan's health authorities as it has occurred at a time when the potentially fatal flu-like disease has been showing signs of resurgence in China, particularly in Beijing, since last week.

This is the first case in Taiwan of an individual being monitored for possible SARS infection since the outbreaks of the atypical pneumonia in China subsided last summer.