The Chinese government has launched a program to guard against new appeared infectious diseases.
The "detecting pioneer" program, jointly run by the Ministry ofHealth and the military's health department, aims to explore and develop new methods and technologies for the rapid checking, testing, tracing, early alert, diagnosis, and isolation and treatment of new infectious diseases.
The program includes studies of the outbreak probability, the setting of test guidelines, and clinical diagnosis.
"Newly appeared infectious diseases means both domestic-bred orintroduced, whether they are mutated or original, which have appeared in the last 30 years, said Professor Jiang Suchun, of theMilitary 302 Hospital.
The Ministry of Science and Technology earlier launched a state-level project to step up research into the prevention and treatment of newly-appeared infectious diseases.
"They threaten the whole world. They have become a global health issue," said an official with the ministry.