The outbreak of the severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS) epidemic in Beijing had enhanced our concern for personal hygiene and physical exercise.The media has also called on people to give up bad habits, live a civilized life, and keep good health.

No Spitting

"Spitting is neither civilized nor sanitary; let's join together to give up this bad habit." This is the wording of an agreement signed between a young girl and her parents on May 20.

Kong Yingying, head mistress of the Nanguan Primary School in Zhengzhou, capital of Henan Province, said all 740 students had signed similar agreements with their parents, as part of an activity organized by the school to improve the hygiene habits of students and their families. The action has won support from students ' parents.

Since the outbreak of SARS, governments of various localities have made energetic efforts to put an end to the bad habit of spitting. Beijing, Shanghai, Guangzhou, Shenzhen, Dalian and some other large cities have revised sanitary management regulations, imposing severe punishment on offenders.

According to revised sanitary management regulations in Shanghai, people who spit on the street can be fined 200 yuan, with those who urinate or litter in public may receive even heavier fines.

In the first 10 days of enforcement of the new regulations in Shanghai, about 1,000 people were charged with spitting, with fines totalling 55,000 yuan. The situation has improved quickly, but punishment is not enough to thoroughly eliminate bad habits. Moreover, the cost of enforcement is high. On May 10, more than 1,800 law-enforcement officers patrolled the streets and public areas of Guangzhou to handle cases of spitting and littering. But, it is impossible to keep so many workers on the streets and in public places. As spitting is an act done in a matter of seconds, an many occasions the offender cannot be found. Hence, it is more important to improve people's conscientiousness.

After the outbreak of SARS, people became increasingly aware of the harm spitting could do and grew even more disgusted with this unsocial behavior. In April, a young man spat on the ground at a bus stop in Tianjin, and people nearby soundly criticized him.

Individual Servings Favored

At the end of April, as SARS was running rampant in Beijing, most restaurants in the city were either closed or had few customers. The turnover of Beijing's catering industry dropped by 50 percent that month, compared with the same period of last year. In Guangzhou, a city also severely hit by SARS, the number of restaurant diners dropped by 30 percent.

During this period, however, Western food outlets such as KFC, McDonald's and Pizza Hut were little affected, probably because of their individual dining portions.

Some star-level hotels and luxurious Chinese cuisine restaurants have also long practiced the Western-style individual portions, but most Chinese restaurants still retain the traditional way, with many people eating from common plates, which can more easily spread diseases, said health experts.

The China General Chamber of Commerce released an emergency circular on April 20, calling on the catering sector to introduce individual dining portions. The following day, the Shanghai Commerce Committee also demanded that restaurants in Shanghai serve individual meals, or become cafeterias.

Shanghai was not severely hit by SARS, but its catering sector remains bleak due to its citizens' precaution against SARS. The Taiwanese-funded Really Good Seafood Restaurant is an exception, thanks to its practice of serving individual portions to diners.

Huang Yin, General Manager of Really Good, said the restaurant's daily lunch turnover amounted to around 10,000 yuan. The restaurant was established in Shanghai in 2001. In the beginning, business was slack, but Huang believed that customers would appreciate its clean and economical individual portion style of dining. As he expected, the restaurant's daily turnover doubled six months later. The merits of individual dining became even more glaring during the SARS outbreak.

Li Qiang, doctorate tutor and Director of the Sociology Department of Tsinghua University, noted that taking the outbreak of SRAS as warning, the Chinese people should give up their traditional method of eating and adopt the individual serving method.

The need for diners to eat separate and individual portions of plated food is an old topic. In 1988, when Shanghai was hit by hepatitis A epidemic, appeals to introduce an individual eating method was on the rise, but when the epidemic waned, the call for this did also. As SARS ran rampant, the appeal rose again.

It is not easy to universalize eating individual portions, because the Chinese people have kept their traditional family style of eating for many years and believe it is social, while serving separate portions appears to be unfriendly.

Shi Rong, from the Shanghai Second Medical University, said it is hard to universalize the serving of individual portions overnight, but it is easier to advise people to use serving utensils, not their own chopsticks, when taking food from a central plate to their own. This method can also help to control cross-infections.

Online dining debates show that many participants favor the individual portion serving method.

Physical Exercise Stressed

One early morning, Wang Hong and her boyfriend arrived at the foot of the Fragrant Hills in west Beijing. They climbed to its peak by 10 a.m., a time when Wang Hong is usually just waking up. Working as a drafting designer, she always gets up late after going to bed well after midnight. The outbreak of SARS has made her aware that looking after her health is very important. So, for physical exercise, she invited her boyfriend to join her in climbing the hill. On the hilltop, bathed in spring sunshine, breathing fresh air and appreciating the lush greenery, they said they felt intoxicated. "It is really enjoyable," she said, and decided to devise a morning exercise plan for weekdays.

Like Wang Hong, many other people now attach greater importance to their physical health. Each morning and evening more people are seen practicing taijiquan and swordplay, dancing, skipping ropes and flying kites in parks and open areas beside streets. In the past, only the elderly and middle aged did so, but now many young people hove joined them.

Medical workers noted that before a vaccine is discovered, the best way to ward off SARS is to raise people's immunity to disease, and physical exercise is helpful .

Some cities have made energetic efforts to promote bodybuilding campaigns. The government of Qingdao, a seaside city in Shandong Province, invited professionals to residential communities to guide their sports and games, and to give lectures on nutrition. More than 2,800 of these skilled personnel are now working at physical exercise stations in 1,800 communities. Exercise equipment has also been installed in many public areas.

In a document issued on April 28, the State General Administration of Sports stressed the role of physical exercise in improving people's health and preventing SARS.

No Eating Wild Animals

On May 11, the Shenzhen-based Jingbao Daily and six other companies called for people to reject eating meat of wild animals, and the proposal was warmly echoed by society. Fifth-grade students from Bujigankeng Primary School recently wrote to Jingbao Daily, calling on all primary and middle school students not to eat wild animals.

A variety of wild animals, including mammals and insects, are favored as a meal by Guangdong people. Some eat them for their delicious taste or nutrition, others just to satisfy their curiosity or to show off their wealth. Owls, civet cats, snakes and ants were previously on the menu of many restaurants, so hunting and selling wild animals under state protection often occurred. These animals have, no doubt, never been quarantined or properly examined before being sold to restaurants for human consumption.

More then 800 restaurants in Shenzhen served up wild animals. Trade in those either captured in the wild or specifically raised for the table approached 800 tons per year, covering more than 100 different species.

After the outbreak of SARS, experts suspected that the epidemic virus had originated from wild animals. A report published by Xinhua News Agency on May 24 announced that experts had found coronavirus in the bodies of some wild animals in an identical sequence as SARS. The SARS virus in civet cat is 99 percent similar to that infecting humans. This indicated that the animal SARS virus is the pre-cursor of the human SARS virus, though the World Health Organization has not yet accepted the idea, and further research is being conducted. Available research results are enough to warn wild animal gourmands.

In fact, eating wild animals can cause over 100 diseases, including rabies, tuberculosis, hepatitis B, the plague and anthrax. Recent years have seen frequent outbreaks of diseases caused by the eating of wild animals, but many people still continue to do so.

Experts have called for legislation to ban the human consumption of wild animals. Liang Congjie, a member of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference National Committee, wrote to the media on May 14, suggesting a revision of the March 1989 Wild Animal Protection Law.

Chen Genchang, Director of the Low Department of the State Forestry Administration, said revision of the law would begin soon. In mid-May, the city of Shenzhen decided to draft a regulation to control the hunting, killing and selling of wild animals within two months.

(Beijing Weekend June 12, 2003)