Thousands riot in Rural Chinese Town over SARS

Chagugang - Thousands of residents of this rural town, believing that a local school would be turned into a ward for urban SARS patients, ransacked the interior of the four-story building on Sunday night.

Chagugang, an agricultural market town about 12 miles northwest of the port of Tianjin, was quiet this morning but the mood was taut a day after the first riot in China related to the deadly disease.

The ravaged junior high school, which was suddenly closed last week for rebuilding into a facility with 200 individual bedrooms, was guarded today by scores of police officers and two buses of paramilitary troops in riot gear. Hundreds more policemen lined the road through the town, preventing residents or visitors from approaching the scene of Sunday night's ugly fracas.

Residents of the town and nearby villages, to a person, were defiant and unapologetic today, expressing resentment over what they regard as one more sign of the disdain that big-city officials have for rural folk.

"We are people too!" snapped an elderly woman, who like others interviewed would not let her name be used. "This disease is exactly what everyone wants to avoid, and they want to throw it right at us."

The school attack is the first reported instance of civic violence directly associated with China's epidemic of SARS or severe acute respiratory syndrome. It suggests that social tensions are rising as fear of the invisible, potentially fatal virus spreads faster than the disease itself, although nearly a hundred more cases were reported in Beijing today.

More conflict appears possible as Chinese authorities who are accustomed to operating in a high-handed manner with the public, especially those in rural areas start applying desperate, often stringent measures to contain a disease that has abruptly been seeded all around the country.

Defending "social stability" has been the first principle of national leaders, who were already on edge over growing unemployment and economic inequality. Now they must also cope with new social and political stresses arising from an epidemic that seemingly came from nowhere, was at first played down and has emerged as a national emergency.

Beyond the devastating medical effects and the inevitable public fears, the epidemic is also dragging down the economy, which could fuel still more discontent.

Several Chagugang residents said that the Sunday night mob had reached more than 10,000 people before it was dispersed by the police around midnight. The number could not be independently verified. By the time the protesters went home, witnesses said, the partially built bedrooms in the school had been ripped apart, construction materials had been burned out front and the windows were shattered, among other damages.

Residents said that during the night and today, the police detained from 20 to 40 suspected participants in the riot.

Local officials declined to provide arrest figures, but an official of Chagugang township, reached by telephone, acknowledged that the violence had occurred and said, "Of course people will be punished if they engaged in smashing property and robbery."

The same official said that the school was being renovated, not to house ill patients with confirmed or suspected SARS, but as a quarantine center for people who had close contacts with SARS patients and for travelers returning from SARS hot spots.

"The villagers are unscientific, and trusted rumors," said another official, a Mr. Wei, of the government of Wuqing District, which includes Chagugang.

The distinction between actual and potential SARS patients in the new facility did not impress local people.

"This just isn't right," said a man who fixes farm machinery in a shop near the school. "If they're afraid of exposing the people in Tianjin to the disease, then why wouldn't they be afraid of exposing all of us out here in the villages?"

Local people said they learned about the project only when the school was suddenly closed, and that officials had done nothing to consult or inform the public about the project.

"One day last week the school was closed, the students were sent away and carpenters came in," a young man said. "The government never communicated with us, but just suddenly decided to build a facility here."

He added: "The people started trashing the school yesterday. Most of the things they just threw into the river, but some pieces of wood they burned outside the school."

Even a central government official from the area, who happened to be visiting from Beijing, expressed sympathy for the protesters. "For the people to protect their interests is a very normal thing," he said. "They can endure economic challenges, but when it comes to matters of health, their tolerance is lower."

Tianjin municipality has not yet been severely hit itself, reporting 22 confirmed and 55 suspected SARS patients as of Sunday, but officials expect the caseload to rise. The city is a two-hour drive from Beijing and receives major truck and train traffic.

In Beijing today, reported SARS cases climbed by another 96 to 1,199, up dramatically from fewer than 350 just one week ago. Officials of the World Health Organization (news - web sites) told reporters today that they remained frustrated by the lack of detailed information on where, when and how the virus had spread through the population.

Without such data, the experts said, it will be impossible to judge whether the city's new quarantines, restrictions on public activities and other actions are appropriate or making any difference.

"Only with that kind of detailed information can we tell you what the risk is to the community," said Dr. Daniel Chin, an epidemiologist temporarily working here with the global health group.

On Sunday, WHO officials met with the Beijing Communist Party Secretary and the acting mayor to discuss the data problems. The city chiefs agreed to cooperate fully, but local health agencies have been struggling with the task of analyzing the flood of cases, the international experts said.

Cumulative SARS cases in China reached 3,106 today, the health ministry reported. China has the most of any country and the potential for a widespread spread of SARS in the Chinese interior, and from China to other parts of the world, have become the chief worries of global health officials. -- Reuters

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