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The World Health Organisation said it is in ongoing contact with authorities in China over an unidentified outbreak of viral pneumonia in the central city of Wuhan, amid concern it may have been transmitted from animals. Wuhan health authorities on Tuesday said 27 people – most of them stallholders at the Huanan Seafood Wholesale Market – had been treated in hospital, with seven said to be in serious condition. Pathology tests were under way to try and identify the virus, officials said. Hong Kong medical authorities were also on alert. Wuhan authorities ordered the closure of the market on Wednesday....

LOS ANGELES, May 9, 2003 -- Chances that a proposed drug for use against SARS will prove effective against the deadly pneumonia epidemic were sharply improved by findings that only insignificant mutations are occurring in the cornoavirus identified as its cause, according to a respected British medical journal, making it a stable target for rapidly-produced "antisense" drugs that prime the immune system to prepare it for the SARS virus and then attack it when the victim is infected. Corvallis, Ore.-based AVI BioPharma CEO Dennis Burger told Congress in sworn testimony May 7 that he believes a compound newly created by...

Advertisement Related Links World Health Organization Toronto — As infectious disease experts around the globe scramble to find the cause of a mysterious and deadly pneumonia, the number of confirmed and suspected cases in Canada rose to 10, public health officials said Sunday. One of two suspected cases is a doctor who treated infected members of a family that was the source of the bulk of the Canadian cases. "My understanding is that she is the family physician who looked after a number of the family members," said Dr. Andrew Simor, head of microbiology at Toronto's Sunnybrook and Women's College...