The number of SARS cases reported in Beijing is dropping precipitously, down to 7 in the latest report (although the WHO continues to have questions about the diagnostic criteria being used here). Life is beginning to get back to normal, although SARS scars are visible everywhere. On campus, they quickly cut a new entrance into the small campus hospital, with one reserved for those with fevers (and with various scary isolation signs in Chinese around it), and the other for everything else. Fences have been put up separating the faculty and student areas of campus. I'm told that the last is something that the security people here have wanted to do for at least 10 years. When SARS came along, this was the perfect justification for imposing a new level of potential control on the campus. Since one of the gates is right outside our apartment building, this is a process we've watched particularly closely. It's not clear if any of the gates will be closed or manned, but it is going to be a real inconvenience for people who live in some of the other apartment buildings, or for students who go to the campus elementary school.

The undergraduate seminar I've been teaching met for the first time in a month today. About half the class (around 15 students) was there). When I came in the students applauded, something that happens far too rarely (ok, never) in my ordinary teaching experience. The class has been an interesting experience, and one I was sorry to see interrupted. It's not clear what's going to happen with students' instruction. I've heard plans to cancel the summer vacation and to have a combined Spring/Fall semester starting sometime in the summer. Ordinarily, that would interfere with faculty research and travel plans, although everyone I know here has cancelled plans to travel elsewhere for research or conferences this summer, fearing they wouldn't be welcome. Because students have a much more fixed curriculum than they do in the United States, it's more likely that something could be worked out logistically here than there would be at an American university. Still, it's going to be a real nightmare at best.

There are still other signs of the ongoing SARS fight in the city at large. Occasionally you're passed by a big SARS ambulance, with its crew and driver dressed in full isolation gear (this must make driving *really* dangerous), and SARS-slogans and posters are everywhere. During the weekend, the neighborhood committees were much more visible than usual (these are people, usually retirees, who form something like a neighborhood watch on steroids. In the past, they had real power over people's lives, distributing ration cards and other emoluments. These days, I don't know what power they have, but they are playing a major role in identifying potential SARS cases).