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HONG KONG, Thursday (AFP) The World Health Organisation (WHO) warned travellers to avoid Beijing and Toronto in a bid to curb the spread of Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome (SARS) as the number of known deaths from the pneumonia virus rose to at least 252.

But the WHO advisory prompted an angry response from Canadian officials who described it as a "gross misrepresentation".

"I'm shocked that the medical evidence before us does not support this advisory," Toronto's Mayor Mel Lastman said.

He was speaking as governments around the world scrambled to contain the deadly disease and Canadian provincial officials sought federal government help in fighting the outbreak in the country, where the SARS death toll rose to 16 on Wednesday.

"Have they (WHO officials) ever been here? ... I want them to investigate Toronto tomorrow. I think they are doing this city and this country a disservice," Lastman said. Most of the 330 reported by the Canadian government cases have been in Ontario, of which Toronto is the capital.

The WHO had already advised against non-essential travel to Hong Kong and the neighbouring province of Guangdong province in southern China, where SARS first appeared six months ago.

It said it was extending the scope of its April 2 travel alert to include Beijing and the northern Chinese province of Shanxi together with Toronto to prevent the further spread of the disease.

The latest travel warning came as more fatalities and new cases of SARS were reported in Hong Kong, China, and Singapore and the economic cost of the crisis spiralled.

In Geneva, the World Trade Organisation (WTO) warned that SARS would hamper the growth of world trade in 2003 and in Washington the US Federal Reserve cited SARS as a factor holding back an ailing US economy by cutting into tourism in some regions of the country. Governments have resorted to increasingly desperate measures to contain the disease, which has defied checks at airports and borders to spread to more than 25 countries.

Latest figures showed nine new deaths and 147 new cases in China, as well as six more deaths and 24 more suspected cases in Hong Kong. The WHO is now reporting 17 deaths in Singapore while suspected new cases were also recorded in Indonesia, Malaysia and Taiwan. Seven weeks after the WHO issued a global alert about SARS, at least 252 people have died and around 4,300 cases have been reported worldwide.

Much of the focus is now on China, where the authorities said they were adopting tougher measures to prevent SARS criss-crossing the vast country and taking a hold on poor rural areas with skeleton medical facilities.

After facing strong criticism for covering up the problem for months, the government has this week been engaged in frenzied efforts to report the scale of the epidemic and limit the fall-out.

State media said every town throughout China was given "strict orders" to report every SARS case and that tens of thousands of people had been mobilised for the mass accounting effort.

In Beijing - along with Hong Kong the worst hit city in the world - signs of panic were beginning to emerge as surgical face masks flooded the streets and rumours caused crowds to converge on supermarkets. In an attempt to reassure the public the city government dispatched hundreds of investigators to round up citizens showing the disease's flu-like symptoms.

Education authorities in Beijing also ordered the suspension of classes at primary and middle schools for a month.

According to the WHO, China has 106 deaths and 2,305 confirmed cases of SARS and the disease has now spread to some of the furthest corners of the country.

In Singapore Prime Minister Goh Chok Tong vowed to push through legislation allowing the government to jail people who repeatedly broke isolation orders.

He said that even before legislation went before parliament, electronic tagging would be introduced for anyone suspected of violating quarantine.

France and the Australian state of New South Wales also moved to tighten restrictions on SARS by designating it a dangerous disease requiring forcible hospitalisation if necessary.

The Philippines quarantined 50 people who had contact with a woman who died of SARS and Malaysia ordered the isolation of 125 lorry drivers who visited an infected market in neighbouring Singapore.

And the Indian Island nation of Mauritius invoked quarantine measures to protect its vital tourism industry, isolating 78 Chinese textile workers.

Meanwhile barely a week after China's state media was claiming SARS was under control, it was Thursday describing the epidemic as "a savage attack against mankind".

"United we stand in the hour of danger," the Communist Party mouthpiece People's Daily declared in a front page editorial.

"It is a battlefield without smoke, as SARS wantonly launches a savage attack against mankind," the daily said, six months after Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome was first detected in China.

"This is a special test for the new leadership of China and the common people and the cadres," it added.

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