The IAPMO Group and the World Plumbing Council (WPC) will host a two-day international symposium on Feb. 11-12, 2004, in Los Angeles, CA, exploring the outbreak of Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome (SARS) in relation to plumbing system design.

The International SARS Symposium will be a forum for plumbing industry professionals, scientists, engineers and healthcare representatives to provide information on SARS, and to discuss and exchange ideas on how it can be prevented from spreading through the plumbing system.

The schedule will include: a discussion of the Hong Kong Health Department's report, which linked the outbreak of SARS to a sanitary system in the Amoy Gardens apartment complex, Kowloon Bay, in February 2003; a discussion of the World Health Organization's meeting on SARS held in Rome, Italy, in September 2003; and the presentation of several papers examining the outbreak of SARS. A compendium of papers will be published together with findings from the symposium.

For more information, visit www.iapmo.org.