October 26, 2005

Bird flu outbreak in China's Anhui reined in

The bird flu outbreak in east China's Anhui province has been brought under control, the country's Ministry of Agriculture said Oct 25.

The ministry said that the province's emergency controls-which included culling nearly 45,000 birds within a three-kilometre radius of the outbreak site, vaccinating 140,000 birds with inactivated mono H5N2 vaccine, and quarantines-have been effective in reining in the bird flu outbreak.

Though the ministry did not specify the source of the outbreak, there was speculation that contact with migratory birds and wild waterfowl was a probable cause.

Meanwhile, China is unlikely to have Tamiflu produced locally any time soon even though Swiss drug-maker Roche has voiced willingness to work with the Chinese government to produce the anti-viral drug.

Roche's Shanghai office reiterated that the production process is complicated, and has not made any significant effort to produce Tamiflu locally.

Sources at the Ministry of Health also said that the authorities have recently negotiated with Roche over the production of Tamiflu, but the company would not give up rights to its patent, which is reportedly protected until 2016.