HK Traces SARS Outbreak in Housing Complex to Sewage System

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Last updated at: (Beijing Time) Friday, April 18, 2003

HK Traces SARS Outbreak in Housing Complex to Sewage System

The spread of the deadly SARS virus in a Hong Kong residential block has been linked to the building's sewage system.

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The spread of the deadly SARS virus in a Hong Kong residential block has been linked to the building's sewage system.

The Amoy Garden housing complex has been one of the centres of the territory's SARS outbreak, with around 321 of its residents coming down with the disease.

Reports say drains on the bathroom floors of the complex have provided a pathway through which residents came into contact with small droplets containing the virus from contaminated sewage.

Water vapour generated during a shower and the moist conditions in the bathrooms could have helped the formation of water droplets which contained the virus.

The droplets travelled through the interconnected sewage pipes. Bathroom extractor fans then sucked the virus into apartments causing the disease to spread.

The Amoy Garden outbreak was linked to a 33-year-old man from Shenzhen in Guangdong province who had chronic renal disease and diarrhea. The man developed SARS symptoms on March 14.

He used the toilet in his brother's flat at Amoy Garden when he visited on March 14 and 19.

Many of those infected at the housing complex also suffered from diarrhea which helped add more contaminated faeces to the sewage system.

However the infections at Amoy Garden do not necessarily show that the virus was waterborne or airborne.

The findings of the report were important because they showed the virus could be transmitted in fecal matter.

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