Parents of Hong Kong children were Monday warned to beware of the spread of a deadly enterovirus that has killed 24 children in China, the dpa reported.
Thousands of Hong Kong people are expected to cross the border to China for a long weekend marking Buddha's Birthday next week and doctors fear the virus may spread to the former British colony.
Twenty-four children, most of them in China's Anhui province, have died and thousands more have been infected by the virus that leads to hand, foot and mouth disease.
Two of the children died in southern Guangdong province, however, which borders Hong Kong, heightening fears that the virus may cross the border in the same way that SARS did in 2003.
Infectious diseases expert Lo Wing-lok told Monday's Standard newspaper that frequent cross-border trips and the forthcoming holiday weekend heightened the risk.
Hong Kong has a handful of cases a year of hand, foot and mouth disease, also known as EV71, which are usually imported from neighboring southeast Asian countries.
EV71 is usually quickly diagnosed and treated and the deaths in Anhui and Guangdong provinces in China are believed to be the result of low awareness about the virus.