Concerns grows over mystery disease

Alarm about the new pneumonia virus that has killed 23 people and put hundreds more in hospital around the world cranked up another notch yesterday. It emerged the latest victims may have caught the disease on a flight with an infected passenger.

As Singapore ordered a 10-day quarantine of 740 people who may have been exposed to the virus, Beijing parents had their children checked at clinics, fear of the lethal bug continued to rise.

In Hong Kong, where 290 people have been diagnosed as "probable" cases of Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome (Sars), nine victims are thought to have been infected while flying to Beijing.

Singapore imposed what was described as one of the largest quarantines in the world. The 740 people affected are confined to their homes, under threat of heavy fines if they venture out. They are mostly friends and relatives of 65 seriously ill people, eight on ventilators.

The World Health Organisation said 13 countries had reported a total of 487 cases of Sars and 17 deaths up to yesterday, compared with 150 cases in seven countries eight days earlier.