Sybase Helps China Fight SARS

Sybase is donating data management technology to China to help wage war on SARS (Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome), the company announced on Monday.

The software will go to the China CDC (Center for Disease Control and Prevention) to enable the organization to establish a data analysis system across the countrys medical departments and institutes, thus enabling faster decision-making in the countrys research, control and prevention of SARS, said officials of the Dublin, Calif., company.

The software to be donated includes Sybase IQ, an analytical relational database designed for data warehousing; Enterprise Application Server; Adaptive Server Enterprise, the companys flagship transactional database; PowerBuilder, the companys application development platform; and PowerDesigner, a tool for modeling and design of business applications.

The China CDC, a social welfare unit of the Peoples Republic of China, has already established a disease reporting system and a nationwide SARS case reporting system and is seeking to improve its data processing capabilities with more efficient data dispersal, faster response rates and increased capacity, said Sybase officials. The agency is also establishing a nationwide system of data analysis to facilitate rapid, informed health decisions.

For more on SARS, see Baselines special report Diagnosis: Disconnected.