China's Health Ministry said in Beijing on April 2 that it will temporarily stop publishing SARS the surveillance report to the public from April 2.
China reported four confirmed severe acute respiratory syndrome(SARS) cases in January this year and no confirmed or suspected SARS cases during the past two months.
On Thursday, hospitals and disease prevention and control centers nationwide started to report infectious diseases to the central government through a new computer network. The ministry spokesman said the SARS epidemic surveillance will be covered in the network and the SARS surveillance report will be included in the ministry's monthly epidemic report.
The spokesman also urged local health authorities not to ease efforts on SARS prevention and control. "SARS should be reported immediately if it occurs and the ministry would report it to the public timely."