Kenya is closely monitoring new reports of cases of the Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome (SARS) in Southeast Asia given the growing business ties between that region and members of the East African Community.

Public health officials in Kenya say the new outbreak in China and other countries in the Far East is under control, and that the World Health Organisation has not yet declared it a global threat.

A monitoring facility desk was set up at Jomo Kenyatta International Airport after last year's outbreak .

The few cases in China have been kept secret, as happened the last time over as WHO officers are on the ground in China monitoring the situation.

Institutional measures have been put in place by the government of China and WHO and everybody travelling out of China is being screened.

"In China, anybody who has had a recent SARS case, and those in suspect health are not getting past the screening desks," said James Sapuro, the Ministry of Health officer in charge of Jomo Kenyatta International Airport.

According to the deputy director (Disease Control) at the Ministry of Health head office, Dr Charles Nzioka, the ministry is "keeping an eye" on the airport. "We are on alert, and there should be no cause for alarm," he said.

Chinese tourists are expected to start arriving in Kenya in large numbers beginning this month.

This follows the award of Approved Destination status to Kenya by the Chinese government. Several forward groups of visitors – mostly travel agents, tour operators and journalists, from the Far East – were in Kenya over the Easter Holidays.

Tanzania is also currently lobbying the Chinese tourist market, which many travel trade business stakeholders in Africa see as a fast growing source of tourists when fully exploited through serious marketing campaigns.

According to Peter Mwenguo, the managing director of the Tanzania Tourist Board (TTB), Tanzania has recently been accredited and registered by the China National Tourism Administration (CNTA) as a qualified nation to invite Chinese tourists.

Before accreditation, about 5,000 Chinese tourists were recorded to have been visiting Tanzania every year, "but their number is expected to shoot up because the CNTA will be encouraging more Chinese to visit Tanzania," says TTB. Under the late socialist president Julius Nyerere, Tanzania enjoyed close ties with China. The Chinese among other things built the Tazara Railway.

On April 30, Chinese authorities reported test results confirming that a 53-year-old woman who died in Anhui Province on April 19 was infected with the SARS carnivorous.
 

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