CHINA: Bird flu project constrained by mainland

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CHINA: Bird flu project constrained by mainland, says expert
University of Hong Kong professor says mainland not providing necessary info to track human-to-human transmission

South China Morning Post
Monday, June 26, 2006

By Patsy Moy

The University of Hong Kong cannot move forward with a computer system to track future human-to-human transmission of bird flu because of "constraints" in collecting data from the mainland, a professor involved in the project says.

Lai Poh-chin, associate professor of geography, said the mainland was not supplying the necessary information about current cases, such as location and details of symptomatic people.

"We've had limitations in accessing the data since March," Dr Lai said.

She is hoping to use the department's geographic information system, which allows for the study of data using maps, to monitor the disease in Hong Kong and on the mainland. The same system was used to identify "high-risk areas" during the Sars epidemic in 2003.

"We can use the system to do predictions such as to identify high-risk areas," she said, adding that her department would work with the Centre for Health Protection in the event of an outbreak.

Legislator Kwok Ka-ki, chairman of the health services panel, said it was not surprising the team was unable to obtain sensitive data from the mainland.

Hong Kong health authorities yesterday expressed concern over a previously unreported H5N1 case in Beijing in November 2003.

Last week, the New England Journal of Medicine published a letter by mainland doctors about a Beijing man who was initially thought to have Sars but was later found to have died from bird flu.

That timing appears to indicate the current H5N1 outbreak in Asian poultry, thought to have begun in South Korea in December 2003, in fact started earlier.

Date Posted: 6/26/2006

http://www.birdflubreakingnews.com/templates/birdflu/window.php?url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.asiamedia.ucla.edu%2Farticle-eastasia.asp%3Fparentid%3D48088

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Re: CHINA: Bird flu project constrained by mainland

China Weighs Fines for Reports on 'Sudden Events


By JOSEPH KAHN
Published: June 26, 2006
BEIJING, June 26 ? Chinese media outlets will be fined up to $12,500 each time they report on "sudden events" without prior authorization from government officials, according to a draft law under review by the Communist Party-controlled legislature.

The law, revealed today in most state-run newspapers, would give government officials a powerful new tool to restrict coverage of mass outbreaks of disease, riots, strikes, accidents and other events that the authorities prefer to keep secret. Officials in charge of propaganda already exercise considerable sway over the Chinese media, but their power tends to be informal, not codified in law.

Although more than 100 million Chinese have access to the Internet and hundreds of commercially driven newspapers, magazines and television stations provide a much wider selection of news and information than was available in the recent past. As a result, Chinese authorities have also sought fresh ways to curtail reporting on topics and events they consider harmful to social and political stability.

Editors and journalists say they receive constant bulletins from the Propaganda Department forbidding reporting on an ever-expanding list of taboo topics, including "sudden events." But a few leading newspapers and magazines occasionally defy such informal edicts. They may find it more costly to ignore the rules if they risked being assessed financial penalties.

The draft, under consideration by the Standing Committee of the National People's Congress, was described in outline by newspapers today.

It says that newspapers, magazines, news Web sites and television stations should face fines ranging from $6,250 to $12,500 each time they publish information about a sudden event "without authorization" or publish "fake news" about such events.

While state media did not offer a definition of "sudden events," in the past they have included natural disasters, major accidents, public health or social safety incidents.

Journalists say local authorities are likely to interpret broadly, giving officials leeway to restrict coverage of any social and political disturbance that they consider embarrassing, like demonstrations over land seizures, environmental pollution or corruption.

Last fall, the National Administration for the Protection of State Secrets removed some information about natural disasters, including the death toll, from a list of topics that government agencies had the power to treat as official secrets. The move was viewed positively at the time as an attempt to provide the public with more timely and accurate information about such disasters.

The declassification came after central and local government authorities initially covered up the SARS respiratory epidemic in 2003. Health authorities later acknowledged that the cover-up made the SARS outbreak more severe.

The new law would appear to undercut the spirit of that revision, forcing journalists and editors to seek prior approval before writing about disease outbreaks.

"The way the draft law stands now it could give too much power to local officials to determine that someone has violated the law," said Yu Guoming, a professor of journalism at People's University in Beijing.

Mr. Yu said he hoped the legislature would review the draft and make its terms "much more specific" to avoid heavy new restrictions on media freedom.

Others suggested that the impact on the press might be mixed.

The new law could make it easier to punish media outlets for even routine reporting. But it also sets a limit on the fine that can be accessed for each violation. Major media outlets could clearly afford to risk a fine if they felt the value of the news in question warranted coverage.

Moreover, the fines could presumably be challenged in court, making them a more active forum in the future for deciding the limits of media controls in the country, a legal expert said.

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/06/26/world/asia/26cnd-clampdown.html?ex=1308974400&en=4506b3a2381fb9d1&ei=5088&partner=rssnyt&emc=rss