Anyone who covers up SARS cases or delays the release of information will be harshly punished as this matter concerns the people's health and safety, he said.

Wen made the call on Friday during a tour of Beijing's kindergartens and schools to inspect SARS prevention and treatment measures.

According to Wen, the central government has already sent supervision teams to the infected areas to monitor local prevention work.

Talking with students and teachers at Beijing University of Aerospace and Aeronautics, Wen said the institution should adopt pertinent and powerful measures to enhance the effective prevention work on the campus and spread SARS prevention information.

Wen urged local governments and related authorities to give more guidance to schools and help them to solve the practical questions in time.

The Ministry of Health announced on Tuesday that no medical institution in China can refuse to admit SARS patients and SARS suspects, otherwise the institution and its staff will face legal proceedings.

In the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region, 30 new SARS patients were admitted to hospitals, while 50 were discharged, according to a statement jointly issued by the Department of Health and the hospital authority of Hong Kong.

Four patients died in hospitals, bringing the total number of SARS-related deaths to 69 in Hong Kong.

A total of 322 patients have recovered from SARS and have been discharged from public hospitals.

Most of the patients currently in hospital are showing positive responses to the new treatment arrangements. Intensive care units are currently treating 120 patients.

Also on Friday, Michael Martin, the counsellor with the Canadian Embassy in Beijing, said that a Canadian visitor to Beijing, who was suspected to have infected with SARS has recovered and was discharged from Beijing Ditan Hospital last Friday and returned to Canada on Tuesday.

According to Martin's knowledge, the victim was not confirmed as a SARS patient by his doctor. However, Xiang Xiaopei, vice-president of Ditan Hospital told China Daily on Thursday the Canadian was infected with SARS.

In 29 provinces, autonomous regions and municipalities of Chinese mainland, the accumulative number of SARS cases rose to 1,482 after 25 new cases were reported on Thursday, of which six were in South China's Guangdong Province, 17 in Shanxi Province in the north, one in Shanghai and one in Central China's Henan Province.

Fatalities from SARS remained unchanged at 65.

Meanwhile, 19 patients in Guangdong were discharged from hospital, bringing the total recoveries to 1,126.

In order to prevent further spread of the disease, the Guangdong quarantine authority has introduced a measure requiring everyone arriving in the South China province to have a health certificate proving they do not have SARS.

The measure went into effect at all ports of entry in Guangdong on April 14.

Sources with the local quarantine authority said health declaration cards will be distributed to passengers before they board airplanes, ships or trains and their completion will be supervised by aircraft commanders, captains and heads of train crew.

In addition, when passengers arrive in Guangdong, health professionals will be on hand to provide health checks and verify the accuracy of the declarations.

(People's Daily April 19, 2003)