JAKARTA, April 4 (UPI) -- Indonesia imposed an anti-epidemic law Thursday, declaring the deadly respiratory viral infection SARS a national epidemic threat in an attempt to curb the spread of the disease.
Health Minister Achmad Suyudi announced the enforcement of a 1984 law on infectious disease, which calls for mandatory health examinations for travelers. He also confirmed the island nation so far had three suspected SARS cases who appeared isolated and were being treated at three different hospitals.
"The three are not in critical condition," Suyudi told reporters at a press conference, adding that health authorities would be able to determine better whether the three likely have SARS after 10 days of observation. No definitive test for the disease SARS -- short for severe acute respiratory syndrome -- is currently available.
Suyudi declined to identify the patients but said one was being treated in Batam, an island just south of Singapore, while two others were treated in Jakarta and Semarang, the provincial capital of Central Java. Another person, an Indonesian female worker who just returned from Taiwan, was also placed under observation status in West Java town of Subang, he added.
The anti-epidemic law stipulates that those entering the country from SARS-affected areas would "have to undergo a medical checkup" and be put into quarantine if the authorities detected symptoms.
"Anyone refused to undergo health tests could face possible one-year imprisonment," said Jusuf Kalla, the Coordinating Minister for People's Welfare.
Local authorities in Batam, about 20 kilometers (12 miles) from Singapore, decided to cancel school classes for four days to ward off an outbreak of the deadly pneumonia-like disease.
Also on Thursday, the government issued a fresh travel advisory, calling on Indonesians to "restricted themselves" from visiting the SARS-affected countries "unless for an emergency."
Although Indonesia has yet to confirm a SARS case in the country, there are at least three Indonesians abroad are known to have suffered from the disease -- two in Singapore and one in Hong Kong, the state-run Antara news agency reported.
The pneumonia-like disease originated in southern China, hit Hong Kong in March and has been spreading around the world, with air travelers getting the bulk of the blame for carrying it from one country to another.
The virus has killed at least 78 people and infected almost more than 2,220 others, especially in Asia. Its mortality rate appears to be between 3 to 5 percent.
Controlling the disease in Indonesia, a sprawling archipelago of some 17,000 islands and 210 million people, many of whom live in poverty in urban slums or villages with few health services, could be a major challenge, health officials said.
