September 12, 2006

EU approves two veterinary bird flu vaccines

The European Commission said Monday (Sep 11) it has given the go-ahead for two vaccines to be used against the bird flu virus, one for use in chickens and one for use in both chickens and Peking ducks.

The two vaccines are Nobilis Influenza H5N2, for use in chickens, and Poulvac FluFend H5N3 RG, for use in both chickens and Peking ducks, the most common breed of duck used for commercial meat.

Both vaccines are administered by injection and have been found to reduce mortality and virus excretion in vaccinated chickens exposed to infection.

The commission said there are no outbreaks of bird flu in domestic or wild birds in the EU at the moment, but the risk of the disease will increase in the coming weeks as the autumn migration period begins.

A spokesman for the European Medicines Agency, Martin Harvey Allchurch, said the two vaccines would protect birds against the H5N1 strain of bird flu which has ravaged poultry farms in Asia and infected several farms in Europe.

But they would also allow the differentiation of vaccinated from infected birds to allow disease investigators to monitor the spread of the virus.