At the end of this month, an unknown cause of pneumonia spread in Wuhan, Hubei province, and Chinese authorities have faced an emergency.

Chinese officials deny it is not SARS, but there are growing numbers of Hong Kong and Macau people who have been to Wuhan, raising concerns about the spread of the disease throughout China during the spring relocation.

By yesterday morning, Wuhan, China, reported 59 cases of unknown pneumonia, of which seven were severe.

Chinese authorities are currently tracking 163 close contacts and there are no deaths to date.

Critically ill patients are also reduced from 11 to seven.

Chinese hygiene authorities and the World Health Organization have begun culturing bacteria to identify pathogens, and it has been reported that it will take a week or two to identify the final disease.

In this regard, the Wuhan Sanitation Committee says the pneumonia excludes respiratory causes such as SARS, MERS, avian influenza and the flu.

However, some have argued that, given China's social control system, the World Health Organization does not know until the final illness is confirmed.

An official said, "The Chinese government has revealed yesterday that neither the SARS nor the MERS is on the Korean side," he said.

"I think the results of the culture test will come out in mid-January, that is, before the spring festival," he said.

The Korean Consulate-General in Wuhan cautioned against the release of the Korea Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

It is estimated that 2,000 people live in Hubei province and 1,000 people in Wuhan.

The number of Hong Kong people who have been to Wuhan and have symptoms such as fever and pneumonia is also increasing.

Hong Kong health officials say there have been eight people who have been to Wuhan within the last 14 days and have suspected fever, respiratory infections and pneumonia.

Suspicious patients included a nine-year-old boy, a two-year-old girl, four men aged 22-55 and two women.

In addition, six Hong Kong people who went to Wuhan yesterday were quarantined because of symptoms associated with pneumonia.

As a result, Hong Kong women who went to Wuhan on September 2 showed symptoms of upper respiratory tract infection and were first quarantined.

This included students from Hong Kong Chinese University who recently returned from studying in Wuhan.

The 20-year-old girl showed pneumonia and was quarantined with her roommate.

The diagnosis revealed that the outbreak was not related to Wuhan because it was associated with common viruses such as the corona virus.

Five other patients were found to be associated with known viruses, such as the flu.

Seven of the 21 people who were quarantined were discharged due to better illness.

As the situation spread, Hong Kong health officials stepped up their response to the “severe” phase and added more infrared cameras to identify high fever patients at the airport.

Macau officials also said that four people recently visited Wuhan and had symptoms such as pneumonia.

But they added that it was caused by a common virus, such as the flu.