GENEVA, Oct 6: Countries must be ready for another Sars outbreak this November, the World Health Organisation (WHO) said on Monday, warning that relaxed safety checks at some laboratories, particularly in China, could increase the risk of fresh contamination.

The virus killed nearly 800 people after it appeared in southern China almost a year ago, possibly by jumping from animals into humans, and the phenomenon could be repeated around the same time this year, said Guenael Rodier, director of the WHO’s communicable diseases and response department.

“We can, just to be prudent, anticipate something this November,” he told a news conference in Geneva.

“We have to be prepared for the return of Sars and we have to be prepared for the emergence of any other disease that is like Sars,” Rodier said.

The reason for the outbreak of the Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome last year remains a mystery, but as it belongs to a family of flu-like viruses it made sense to be on the alert at this time when the influenza season starts in Asia, added Angela Merianos, a Sars expert with the WHO.

“We don’t know if Sars will come back but we need to be prepared for it because it is a respiratory illness,” she said.

Natural transmission of Sars through humans was officially stopped in June after a huge international effort to contain the virus.

Any resurgence would likely be through contact with a contaminated wild animal, particularly in Southeast Asia, or at a laboratory which is studying the disease, such as a recent case seen in Singapore where a researcher fell ill, the WHO said.

The virus should be contained at the second highest laboratory security level — bio-safety level three (BSL3) — to prevent it from escaping, explained John MacKenzie, head of the WHO’s laboratory group.

“It is a dangerous virus. We need to use containment facilities that are both adequate to protect the people and the community should there be an accident,” MacKenzie told reporters.

“There might be some laboratories, perhaps in China, where BSL3-level laboratories are not being used ... and this is obviously a risk,” he warned.

A WHO advisory committee is due to meet towards the end of the month to discuss laboratory safety as well as attempts to develop a quality control system to test for Sars.

“We are going to try very hard to get countries to agree to contain the virus under levels that are appropriate,” said MacKenzie.

The world health body did not know how many laboratories in total currently work with Sars, though it said there were at least three in Hong Kong, one in Vietnam and others in countries like Australia and the United States.

“But in China we have no idea at all how many laboratories are holding the virus, none whatsoever, and that is really what worries me rather a lot,” admitted MacKenzie.

More research was also needed into how Sars was passed from animal to human — thought to be the original source of the outbreak — he continued.

The WHO wanted routine tests on wild animals that could carry the disease and are commonly sold in Asia such as civets to be routinely tested, added Pierre Formenty, a WHO expert in animal-human disease.

With many lessons learned from the first Sars epidemic, which infected more than 8,000 people, countries were working hard to prepare themselves for another crisis, Rodier said.

“A lot of work has been done in China, Singapore and Hong Kong,” he said.—AFP