NEW YORK (CNN/Money) - The Bac Ai Pharmacy in Chinatown here sells about 20 surgical masks each day -- masks that look just like the ones worn by so many on the streets of Hong Kong and Beijing nowadays.

And that's exactly where the pharmacy's masks end up, according to Willie Cheng, an employee, who said customers buy them to mail to friends and relatives in China, where SARS has killed 219 people, according to the World Health Organization.

Masks at the Bac Ai Pharmacy may end up in China.

International shipments like these go a long way to explaining the neighborhood's ties to SARS. On the one hand, fear of the mysterious respiratory virus has not gripped New York's Chinatown, a densely populated area in lower Manhattan that is home to as many as 150,000 people.

But the contagious virus, according to people interviewed here, is not helping the tourist-dependent area that was shut down following the nearby Sept. 11 terrorist attacks and has suffered from an economy that has barely bounced back since.

"Now, empty here," said Andy Liu, who runs the Chinatown Gift Shop on Mott Street.

As Liu spoke, tourists and office workers strolled by his store that sells green foam Statue of Liberty crowns, rubber snakes and hand fans. But the sidewalks are not as crowded as they were two years ago, said Liu, who tried to make the case for more visitors.

"It's very safe in New York City," he said.

Chris Lim closes a sale at the Chinatown Gift Shop in New York.

The numbers back that up. The New York City Department of Health and Mental Hygiene says there have been two probable cases of the respiratory virus in a city of 8 million. No one here, or anywhere else in the United States, has died from the disease.

Not a single person was seen wearing a mask during a stroll through the area Thursday afternoon. But at Manning's Pharmacy, on Elizabeth Street, masks selling for $3 a piece were displayed by the cash register.

Amy Deng, who works at Manning's, said they are selling well, but could not estimate how many she unloads each day. A young woman who bought a box of masks declined to discuss her purchase.

Three thousand miles away, in San Francisco's Chinatown, Kevin Hsieh says people are turning to Eastern remedies to ward off a virus that has infected 14 people in the nation's most populous state, according to the Centers for Disease Control.

Hsieh, who runs San Francisco Chinatown.com, described a hoax e-mail about an infected restaurant worker that caused panic earlier this month. And to the south, in San Jose, a plane flying from Tokyo was kept on the tarmac for about an hour this month after several passengers reported symptoms of the pneumonia-like virus.

But Hsieh said life in San Francisco's Chinatown, which claims to be the nation's largest Chinatown, has not visibly changed. "If there start to be these cases that start popping up, you may see more fear coming," he said.

At Manning's, the surgical masks are right by the cash register.

The biggest commotion in New York's Chinatown Thursday came not from SARS but from the Abacus Federal Savings Bank. There, dozens of people lined up to withdraw money after an employee was fired for embezzlement. The bank says it has enough funds, which are government insured, to meet depositors' needs.

One block west, John Antush, who works for the National Mobilization Against Sweatshops, a workers' advocacy group, said the neighborhood is not without respiratory problems. But the source of those ailments, he said, was the dust that swept the area following the terrorist attacks 19 months ago.

"I think that's been much more dangerous," Antush said.

Perceptions of danger affect spending decisions. The Federal Reserve Wednesday signaled as much by mentioning the virus in its periodic assessment of the nation's economy.

"San Francisco noted that international travel had weakened, due in part to the SARS outbreak in Asia," the Fed said. Dallas "observed a decline in air travel due to the onset of the war and the SARS outbreak," the central bank said in its so-called Beige Book, which looks at economic activity nationally and by region.

American International Group Inc (AIG: Research, Estimates)., the New York-based insurer based blocks from Chinatown, said Thursday it expects SARS to have "a slight impact on profitability" on its overseas business.

A run on the Abacus Federal Savings Bank in New York.

"SARS may impede agents from freely visiting customers and will likely have some dampening effect on new sales in certain Asian markets," according to AIG, which sells a big chunk of its insurance policies in Asia.

But the illness is unlikely to have a dramatic impact on the U.S. economy because unlike China, Canada, Singapore, Vietnam and Taiwan, the United States has not been among the countries most affected, economists say. The CDC in Atlanta said there are only 37 probable SARS cases in the country.

Back at Chinatown Gift Shop on Mott Street, Chris Lim, an employee who was trying to draw passersby into the store, said it was difficult to know how much SARS has affected business. Then she moved on to help a customer.