Asia stepped up its defences Tuesday against a new SARS-like virus, introducing mandatory screenings at airports of arrivals from high-risk areas of China as authorities move to head off a billowing regional health crisis.

From Bangkok to Hong Kong and Seoul to Sydney, authorities have gone onto high-alert over the new coronavirus, following China's confirmation of the first case of human-to-human transmission of the deadly illness.

Four people have died in China while scores more have been infected with the virus.

Cases have been detected in Thailand, Japan and South Korea as the World Health Organization said it would meet to discuss declaring a global public health emergency over the outbreak.

Thai authorities have introduced mandatory thermal scans of passengers arriving from high-risk areas of China at its airports in Bangkok, Chiang Mai, Phuket and Krabi.

Those passengers will be screened "without exemption", health minister Anutin Charnvirakul said in a statement, adding if they exhibit signs of fever they will be quarantined for 24 hours for monitoring.

A quarter of all international flights from Wuhan -- the epicentre of the deadly virus -- arrive in Thailand.

Around 1,300 passengers are expected each day from Wuhan over Chinese New Year, which starts this weekend.

Thailand is desperate to avoid a damaging outbreak during peak tourist season.

Two Chinese arrivals in Thailand have been found with the new strain of the virus -- one of whom has since been discharged from hospital and has returned to China.

In Hong Kong, the southern Chinese city where memories of a 2002-3 outbreak of Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome (SARS) that killed hundreds still haunt the city, authorities said they were on "extreme high alert".

"We are... preparing for the worst. We have not lowered our guard," Hong Kong's number two leader, Chief Secretary Matthew Cheung, told reporters.

Hong Kong airport already routinely screens the temperatures of all passengers arriving at the airport, one of the world's busiest.

Those arriving from Wuhan have to fill out health declarations and face fines and up to six months jail if they fail to declare symptoms.

On Monday, hospital authorities said they would monitor anyone with a fever who bad been to Hubei province, where Wuhan is located.

Taiwan meanwhile went onto its second-highest alert level for those travelling to and from Wuhan, advising visitors to avoid visiting any live poultry markets while screening has been stepped up at airports.

China's vast land borders with its neighbours have also come under scrutiny.

Vietnam's health ministry has ordered more border checks as "the risks of infection are high" given the daily cross-border flow of goods and people.

As fears over the reach of the outbreak mount, Australian health officials said they have restricted a man to his home after he returned from Wuhan showing symptoms of the virus -- the country's first suspected case.

What we know so far about the new China virus
Beijing (AFP) Jan 21, 2020 - A new SARS-like virus has killed six people in China and infected nearly 300 others.

Fears have been mounting that the virus will spread during the massive annual Lunar New Year migration. A host of Asian countries and the United States have introduced new screening checks for passengers from Wuhan, the Chinese city identified as the epicentre.

Here's what we know about the virus:

- It's entirely new -

The virus appears to be a never-seen-before strain of coronavirus -- a large family of viruses that can cause diseases ranging from the common cold to Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome (SARS), which killed 349 people in mainland China and another 299 in Hong Kong between 2002 and 2003.

Arnaud Fontanet, head of the department of epidemiology at the Institut Pasteur in Paris, told AFP the current virus strain was 80 percent genetically identical to SARS.

China has already shared the genome sequencing of this novel coronavirus with the international scientific community.

For now, it is being dubbed "2019-nCoV".

- It's being passed between humans -

The World Health Organization said Monday it believed an animal source was the "primary source" of the outbreak, and Wuhan authorities identified a seafood market as the centre of the epidemic.

But China has since confirmed that there was evidence the virus is now passing from person to person, without any contact with the market.

Doctor Nathalie MacDermott of King's College London said it seems likely that the virus is spread through droplets in the air from sneezing or coughing.

Doctors at the University of Hong Kong published an initial paper Tuesday modelling the spread of the virus which estimated that there have been some 1,343 cases in Wuhan -- similar to a projection of 1,700 last week by Imperial College, London.

Both are much higher than official figures.

- It is milder than SARS -

Compared with SARS, the symptoms appear to be less aggressive, and experts say the death toll is still relatively low.

According to authorities in Wuhan, 25 of the more than 200 people infected in the city have already been discharged.

"It's difficult to compare this disease with SARS," said Zhong Nanshan, a renowned scientist at China's National Health Commission at a press conference this week. "It's mild. The condition of the lung is not like SARS."

However, the milder nature of the virus can also cause alarm.

The outbreak comes as China prepares for the Lunar New Year Holiday, with hundreds of millions travelling across the country to see family.

Professor Antoine Flahault, director of the Institute of Global Health at the University of Geneva, told AFP that the fact that the virus seems milder in the majority of people is "paradoxically more worrying" as it allows people to travel further before their symptoms are detected.

"Wuhan is a major hub and with travel being a huge part of the fast approaching Chinese New Year, the concern level must remain high," said Dr Jeremy Farrar, Director of the Wellcome Trust.

- International public health emergency? -

The WHO will hold a meeting on Wednesday to determine whether the outbreak constitutes a "public health emergency of international concern" and if so, what should be done to manage it.

The agency has only used the rare label a handful of times, including during the H1N1 -- or swine flu -- pandemic of 2009 and the Ebola epidemic that devastated parts of West Africa from 2014 to 2016.

The Chinese government announced Tuesday it was classifying the outbreak in the same category as the SARS outbreak, meaning compulsory isolation for those diagnosed with the disease and the potential to implement quarantine measures on travel.

But if the WHO decides to take this step, it would put the Wuhan virus in the same category as a handful of very serious epidemics.

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SARS-like virus spreads in China, nearly 140 new cases
Beijing (AFP) Jan 20, 2020
A mysterious SARS-like virus has killed a third person and spread around China - including to Beijing - authorities said Monday, fuelling fears of a major outbreak as millions begin travelling for the Lunar New Year in humanity's biggest migration. The new coronavirus strain, first discovered in the central city of Wuhan, has caused alarm because of its connection to Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome (SARS), which killed nearly 650 people across mainland China and Hong Kong in 2002-2003. Wuhan ... read more