Beijing: China on May 14 reported five new deaths and 55 more cases of Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome (SARS), the lowest figures since the virulent epidemic struck the world's most populous nation, even as epidemiologists warned the government against lowering its guard.

The lower nation wide figures of SARS came as experts from World Health Organisation (WHO) cautioned China against any complacency in its fight against the killer disease that has claimed over 580 lives world wide and 267 in China alone.

WHO representative in China Henk Bekedam advised caution until the new cases numbers went down to single digits.

"I still believe if you have 40 to 50 new cases a day, that's still quite a big number of extra cases," he said as 55 new infections and five new deaths were reported on May 14, bringing the nationwide toll to 267 and number of cumulative cases to 5,124.

In neighbouring Hong Kong, two more deaths and nine new cases were reported, the Health Ministry said.

Of the new cases, 39 were in Beijing, where five new fatalities were reported, bringing the total to 139 and confirmed cases to 2,350.

"The bottom line is that it is too early to say that the epidemic is tailing down, but we do hope to see that in the next few weeks," Keiji Fukuda, a WHO expert studying SARS, told reporters.

"It is possible that in about a week we will see another upward surge…but we can't relax efforts," he said.

PTI