U.S. health officials said on Thursday they were homing in on a virus believed to cause a globe-trotting respiratory infection and added six more cases to the American toll.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said evidence was mounting that a coronavirus, a member of a family of viruses best known for causing the common cold, was involved in the illness now known as severe acute respiratory syndrome.

The CDC reported it was monitoring 51 suspect cases in 21 states. "So far, happily, there have been no deaths attributed to SARS in patients in the United States," Dr. Jim Hughes, head of the CDC's infectious disease branch, told reporters.

Worldwide, more than 1,400 people have been reported with SARS in 12 countries and more than 50 have died.

Hughes said 44 of the U.S. cases involved people who had traveled to Vietnam, China or elsewhere in Southeast Asia, the region hardest hit by the syndrome.

"Five cases are in people who have had contact with people who were ill with SARS, and there are two health-care workers who are ill as a result of caring for one patient," he said.

Although the disease has been characterized by pneumonia, Hughes said many of the U.S. patients have had no evidence of pneumonia -- defined as an infection of the lung tissue.

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