Epidemiological study on severe acute respiratory syndrome in Guangdong province

• Published in: Zhōnghuá liúxíngbìng zázhì Vol. 24; no. 5; p. 350
• Main Authors: Peng, Guo-wen, He, Jian-feng, Lin, Jin-yan, Zhou, Duan-hua, Yu, De-wen, Liang, Wen-jia, Li, Ling-hui, Guo, Ru-ning, Luo, Hui-ming, Xu, Rui-heng
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: Chinese
• Published: China 01.05.2003
• Subjects: Adolescent; Adult; Aged; Aged, 80 and over; China - epidemiology; Contact Tracing; Disease Outbreaks; Family Health; Female; Humans; Incidence; Infectious Disease Transmission, Patient-to-Professional; Male; Middle Aged; Retrospective Studies; Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome - epidemiology; Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome - mortality; Surveys and Questionnaires; China
• ISSN: 0254-6450

To understand the epidemiological characteristics of severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS) outbreaks in some areas of Guangdong province and to provide scientific basis for prevention and control measures against it. Standardized questionnaire was used on individual cases. Data on the epidemiological characteristics as time, place, persons and aggregation status of SARS cases, development of the epidemics, were analyzed with software EPI 6.0. The incidence of SARS in Guangdong province was 1.72/100,000 with case fatality rate as 3.64%. Most cases of SARS occurred between the last ten days of January and the first ten days of February with the peak (61.88% of the patients) occurred in the first ten days of February. As to the distribution of place, Pearl river delta region-economically developed with great number of mobile population-was heavily affected areas (account for 96.66% of the total patients). The majority of patients were young adults and medical staff seemed to be the most affected subgroup (acc