Clinical Presentation

The most common symptom in SARS patients is fever with a body temperature of > 38.0°C (100.4°F). Fever is therefore a main criteria in the current WHO case definition for suspected or probable SARS. However, fever may be absent during the early stages of the disease and in individuals with co-morbidities who may be impaired in their ability to mount a fever.

Fever is mostly associated with other symptoms including chills, rigors, headache, dizziness, malaise, and myalgia (CDC, Lee, Tsang, Peiris, Chan-Yeung, Donnelly, Booth). The frequency of these symptoms within different cohorts are shown in table 1. Thus, the initial symptoms may resemble those of other forms of "atypical pneumonia" which are usually caused by legionella, mycoplasma and chlamydia species.

Sputum production, sore throat, coryza, nausea, and vomiting are less common (Lee, Booth). Inspiratory crackles may be heard at the base of the lung. Wheezing is generally absent. Diarrhea only seemed to be a prominent symptom in the Amoy Gardens’ outbreak in Hong Kong