On March 12, the Ministry of Health disclosed details of infectious diseases nationwide for February 2007.

A total of 236,288 categories A and B infection cases were reported nationwide on the mainland resulting in 432 deaths.

Cases reported accounted for all 22 types of categories A and B infectious diseases except for plague, SARS, poliomyelitis, dengue fever and diphtheria.

Coming out as the most reported disease was pulmonary tuberculosis (TB), followed by hepatitis B, syphilis, dysentery and measles. These five accounted for 86.89 percent of reported cases.

Rabies was recorded as the deadliest infectious disease with TB, hepatitis B, AIDS, and cerebrospinal meningitis also causing a number of fatalities. And 89.58 percent of deaths in February could be ascribed to these diseases.

A total of 46,430 cases of category C infectious diseases were seen, leading to 6 deaths. Although no cases of filariasis were reported, infectious diarrhea, mumps, and German measles accounted for 93.80 percent of illnesses in this category.

During February, 9,501 cases of measles and 2,341 cases of German measles were detected indicating a sharp rise in cases over last year, with instances of these diseases up by 68.43 and 133.87 percent respectively. 2007 has seen a rapid increase in the number of measles cases with some regions reporting widespread outbreaks.

(Ministry of Health, March 12, 2007)