China orders nationwide fight against fatal virus

(Rewrites with colour, official's remarks, other provinces)

By Andrew Torchia

SHANGHAI, May 3 (Reuters) - China ordered authorities across the nation on Saturday to fight hand, foot and mouth disease, after a rapidly spreading outbreak killed at least 23 children and infected nearly 4,000.

"Our doctors will leave hospitals to find potential patients rather than sitting in the hospitals to wait for them," deputy health minister Liu Qian told state television in the worst-hit area, Fuyang city in the eastern province of Anhui.

The Ministry of Health said cases of the disease might increase in coming months, because June and July were the peak season for it. Cases in some Chinese provinces, as well as Taiwan and Singapore, are running above year-ago levels, it said.

It ordered health authorities across the country to report all cases within 24 hours. Officials would visit nurseries and primary schools to educate staff on hygiene and prevention steps, and Chinese scientists would step up research into the disease.

In Fuyang, 22 children have died from hand, foot and mouth disease and 3,321 have been infected, of which 978 were in hospital and 58 were critically ill or in serious condition, the ministry said.

State television showed pictures of anxious mothers bringing their children to hospital and of frightened children lying in hospital beds, one of them with bandages around his head.

The ministry said special equipment was being installed in children's wards of Fuyang hospitals to treat patients, while local authorities were strengthening supervision of food safety and water quality in an effort to stop the disease from spreading.

Kindergardens in Fuyang, which had been due to reopen on Monday after a holiday weekend, would stay closed until May 12.

DELAY IN REPORTING

The disease began spreading in Anhui in early March, but a delay in reporting it to the public until last weekend triggered heated discussion and criticism in the Chinese media, which said local government officials should be sacked.

An initial cover-up of the SARS epidemic in 2003 led to the sacking of Beijing's mayor and the health minister.

But health officials say there was no cover-up in Anhui and the reason for the delay in this case was that medical teams were trying to work out what the illness was.

Hand, foot, and mouth disease, characterised by fever, sores in the mouth and a rash with blisters, is a common illness among infants and children and is usually not fatal, according to the National Center for Infectious Diseases in the United States.

But the cases in Fuyang were caused by infection with the enterovirus 71, or EV71. Complications due to EV71 were responsible for the deaths in Fuyang, the World Health Organization said on its Website (www.who.int).

In addition to Anhui, hand, foot and mouth disease has been reported this year without fatalities in several other eastern and central Chinese provinces, including Shaanxi, with 118 cases, and Hubei, with 340, the official Xinhua news agency said.

But the death of an 18-month-old boy in the southern province of Guangdong on Friday suggests the disease may now have spread to the south. The boy apparently died from the disease after contracting it through EV71, Xinhua reported.

There is no vaccine or antiviral agent available to treat or prevent EV71. Enteroviruses spread mostly through contact with infected blisters or faeces and can cause higher fever, paralysis and swelling of the brain. (Reporting by Andrew Torchia)