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SARS virus identified

Washington, April 10
Scientists said today that they had identified the virus behind the deadly respiratory illness spreading worldwide and proposed naming it after a doctor who first identified the disease and later became a victim.

The new coronavirus, a relative of one of the many viruses that cause common cold, is, as suspected, new to humans, two research teams reported in the New England Journal of Medicine. The finding means that doctors can now concentrate on developing a simple test for the virus that will tell them right away whether a patient has Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome (SARS). Reuters