May 20, 2005

EU bird flu early warning system in development

The European Union has taken another step towards creating an early warning system to prevent, or at least to limit, an influenza pandemic with the launch of a new continent-wide monitoring system.

Establishing a round-the-clock surveillance network to identify any European outbreaks will be the first task for the newly created European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control which becomes operational in Solna, near Stockholm, tomorrow.

It will also begin work on building a network of "reference laboratories" across Europe to analyse flu across the continent, and a system to monitor vaccinations against the virus.