The Beijing Municipal Government will cooperate completely with the
World Health Organization (WHO)in an active and honest way to fight
SARS, said Beijing top officials at a meeting with WHO China
representative Henk Bekedam Sunday.
As
an international metropolis, Beijing had a strong desire to
strengthen international cooperation, especially with the WHO in
the fight against SARS, said Liu Qi, a member of the Political
Bureau of the Communist Party of China (CPC) Central Committee and
secretary of the Beijing Municipal Committee of the CPC.
"From April 27, Beijing Municipal Government will provide more
details about SARS, including the figures of SARS patients in each
district, the names of isolated hospitals and residential
buildings, the number of isolated people," said Liu, also head of
Beijing's SARS control working group.
Considering WHO's valuable experience with SARS, Beijing government
welcomed WHO experts to join in improving its disease prevention
plan and hoped the WHO could recommend expert advisers for
Beijing's SARS control working group, who would be invited to
attend relevant meetings, said Liu.
The local government would publish SARS information and knowledge
in various ways to satisfy different demands. Local citizen were
usually knowledgeable about good hygiene and kept a close watch on
the latest SARS information, while many rural laborers in Beijing
needed basic hygiene knowledge and medical services, said Wang
Qishan, acting major of Beijing.
Wang stressed that the Beijing government sincerely hoped for
helpful advice from the WHO, which was experienced in helping
developing countries, especially effective guidance in cutting off
the infection channels of SARS and internationally-accepted
prevention standards of infectious diseases.
"We would like to share SARS information with WHO so as to improve
the transparency and efficiency of our information publicity," said
Wang.
Wang also proposed to establish a hotline between both sides oropen
an office for WHO experts to improve cooperation.
Bekedam told Xinhua after the meeting that he had seen that the
Chinese government is very serious about SARS and had put very
senior people in charge of dealing with SARS, and the WHO is
looking forward to working together with departments concerned in
fighting SARS.
He
stressed that it was very important to communicate well with the
public, with the media and with the international community about
what the government is doing.
He
said he and his colleagues are impressed by what Beijing has been
doing, but he thought that improvement is still needed in
communication with the public, so as to let the latter have a
better understanding of what is happening, a better understanding
of what the figures mean, through which they will also know how
toprotect themselves.
(Xinhua News Agency April 28, 2003)
