Ⅰ.General Situation of the Epidemics

In the 33rd week of 2008 (from 0 a.m. on August 18 to 12 p.m. on August 24), 3,351 cases of 15 kinds of legally defined infectious diseases and 5 dead cases (namely 1 case of HIV/AIDS, 2 cases of hepatitis B, and 2 cases of tuberculosis) were reported. Among them, there are 1419 cases of 10 types of class B infectious diseases, down 0.56％ from last week and down 44.27％ from the same period of last year. The top five kinds of diseases with the highest incident rates are: dysentery (861 cases), tuberculosis (220 cases), hepatitis B (123 cases), syphilis (76 cases), gonorrhea (37 cases), and measles (37 cases); 1,932 cases of five types of class C infectious diseases were reported, down 3.5％ from the last week and down 37.01％ from the same period of last year. Moreover, the five kinds of diseases, including infectious diarrhea, hand-foot-mouth disease, epidemic parotitis, urticaria and acute hemorrhagic conjunctivitis, take up 57.65% of the total number of legally defined infectious disease cases, down 37.01% over the same period of last year.

II. Analysis of the Major Epidemics

(1) Hand-foot-mouth disease
This week 253 cases were reported, down 6.3% from last week. The top six districts and counties with the most reported cases are: Fengtai, Chaoyang, Haidian, Changping, Miyun and Yanqing, accounting for 68.38% of the total number. Those infected are mainly scattered-living children and kindergarten kids. They take up 90.51% of the reported patients. There is no report of concentrated outbreaks of epidemics.
　
(2) Diarrhea
This week 861 cases are reported throughout the city, up 0.82% from last week and down 56.12% from the same period of last year. Scattered-living children, retirees, cadres, students, and unemployed people (76 cases) account for 71.08% of the reported patients.

Ⅲ. Key Notes

A large number of the students and matriculates from both downtown and outside Beijing will flock into kindergartens, primary schools, high schools, colleges and universities on September 1 to start their new school term. However, the high density of students in these places may cause increased risk of the spread of infectious respiratory diseases; therefore we strongly suggest that all primary schools and high schools strictly examine whether all students have gone through vaccination and ensure those failed to do so to make up promptly, and pay special attention to infectious disease prevention and control, and carry out examinations every morning and noon so that infectious diseases would be detected and reported sooner. Universities should immediately vaccinate non-local matriculates against DPT (diphtheria, pertussis, tetanus) and measles to ensure 100 percent of vaccination coverage rate.