Seven Alice Ho Miu Ling Nethersole Hospital staff with respiratory illness do not have SARS, it has been confirmed.

Secretary for Health, Welfare & Food Dr Yeoh Eng-kiong said tests showed the healthcare workers had contracted some form of flu-like illness, however it was not the SARS coronavirus.

Further confirmative tests will be conducted to ascertain the cause of their ailment.

Dr Yeoh said the illness is very mild and most of the seven have already returned to work.

Dr Yeoh said Hong Kong should adopt the recommendations of the World Health Organisation to develop a SARS alert mechanism.

He said the mechanism will be brought into action if:

* there are more than two healthcare workers in a hospital from the same ward who come down with a pneumonia-like illness, which cannot be explained by any other causes; or,

* there are three or more individuals in a ward, including staff, patients or their relatives, who come down with a pneumonia-like illness which cannot be explained by other causes.

"So this alert mechanism will bring into force the investigations of both the hospital and the Department of Health to make sure that if there is any outbreak we are able to contain it at the soonest possible time," he said.

The Government has been doing a lot of work to prepare for any possible outbreak but the public's individual contributions of ensuring personal and environmental hygiene is a very important component of the preventive action, Dr Yeoh said.