Health officials allay fears over new virus

Senior health officials have assured Qatar residents that a newly-detected Sars-like virus, which has so far killed two people across the world and made a third person - a Qatari - critically ill in a London hospital, is not yet a pandemic.  The World Health Organisation (WHO) announced yesterday that a 49-year-old Qatari man was critically ill in a London hospital after contracting an infection similar to the deadly Sars (severe acute respiratory syndrome) virus that emerged in 2002 and eventually killed around 800 people. Among those killed by the virus recently is a 60-year-old Saudi national. “We would like to assure Qatar residents that there is no cause to panic because this is a new type of virus, which was detected in London,” Supreme Council of Health Public Health Department director Dr Mohamed al-Thani told an urgently-convened media briefing yesterday evening.

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