Wall Street Journal - May 22, 2003
Vanessa Fuhrmans and Gautam Naik, Staff Reporters of The Wall Street Journal

The fund, which the WHO plans to announce on Thursday in Geneva, is aimed primarily at building up China's public-health infrastructure in order to bring the virus under control within the next few months. Health officials see September, the start of flu season in many parts of the world, as a critical deadline for stopping SARS, or severe acute respiratory syndrome.

If it isn't contained, new outbreaks could spread much further and kill more people, this time also in Europe and the U.S.

Officials steering the fund declined to say how much money has been pledged so far or which companies have stepped forward. But a wide range of companies, including investment banks, media companies and industrial groups, have pledged enough to suggest that they will raise the $100 million by September, the officials said.

The WHO decided to set up the fund after a number of companies contacted the Geneva-based health organization about contributing money or other support toward eradicating the virus. Many with operations in Asia have been hit by the virus themselves, in both their work forces and bottom lines.

The desire to launch a SARS fund to boost China's disease-surveillance systems also underscores a glaring problem for global health: In an era of jet travel and urban overcrowding, the public-health chain is only as strong as its weakest link. And China, where millions of animals and people live in close proximity, has long been a breeding ground for new diseases, including SARS. Strengthening surveillance and response to new bugs in China is crucial to preventing their spread around the world.

"China is seen as the key," said Kate Taylor, head of the World Economic Forum's Global Health Initiative, which will help steer the fund. "If the epidemic can be controlled there, then the global epidemic will be controlled."

Much of the money will go toward training health workers, beefing up measures to monitor new outbreaks and quarantining and treating people who become infected. It also will be used for new and better laboratory equipment to diagnose SARS quickly, as well as tracking systems to better trace who may have come in contact with an infected person.

If necessary, some of the funding may eventually be used to assist other countries in battling the virus, though the WHO said its first priority is China.

Earlier Wednesday, the WHO's newly-elected director general acknowledged the global challenge. "SARS is the first new disease threat of the 21st century, but it will not be the last," said Dr. Jong-Wook Lee of the Republic of Korea, in his acceptance speech to the World Health Assembly.

There is an urgent need for "stronger disease surveillance and response mechanism at local, national and global levels."

Each day, the WHO sorts through some 200 to 300 reports of disease outbreaks in various corners of the world; only about 15 to 20 of these tend to have spread across borders, according to Mike Ryan, coordinator of the WHO's global alert and response network. "You're going to see more alerts in the future," said Dr. Ryan, in a recent interview.

The relative speed with which the WHO has moved to start the SARS fund indicates that both the paucity of its own financing, as well as an effort to learn from its past errors. It was several years before the Geneva agency or any other international group launched a similar global fund to fight AIDS, for example. Since then, this approach has become much more popular, especially for fighting infectious diseases that easily cross borders, including malaria and tuberculosis.

Write to Vanessa Fuhrmans at vanessa.fuhrmans@wsj.com and Gautam Naik at gautam.naik@wsj.com

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