November 24, 2005

 

Vietnam reports new human case of bird flu
 

 

Vietnamese health authorities have reported that a 15-year-old boy from the northern port city of Haiphong was the latest person to test positive for the deadly H5N1 strain of bird flu.

 

The boy remained hospitalised but is expected to fully recover, said Nguyen Van Binh, deputy director of the Ministry of Health's Preventive Medicine Department.

 

The Tourism Administration of Vietnam also ordered all tour operators not to take foreigners near areas where bird flu outbreaks have been reported, said Vu The Binh, director of the central Tourism Department.

 

Most major hotels and restaurants have also stopped serving poultry. However, tourism authorities have not banned such sales.

 

Binh said bird flu has not yet had any impact on the country's tourism industry with three million foreign arrivals so far this year as of Nov 11. The number is expected to reach 3.4 million by the end of this year, he added.

 

Meanwhile Thursday, the state-run China Daily newspaper reported that China was "within days" of testing a bird flu vaccine on people. There are currently no human vaccines against the disease.

 

The vaccine trial would involve 100 people between the ages of 18 and 60, the newspaper cited Lu Zhenyou, spokesman for Sinovac Biotech Ltd. (SVA), one of the developers, as saying. China's Centers for Disease Control and Prevention were also involved in the 21-month process.

 

It would take at least a year before the two-phase trials would be finished, Lu said. The second round would involve testing on more people, he said without elaborating.

 

If approved, the vaccine would be given first to high-risk groups such as veterinary and laboratory workers and poultry farmers in infected areas, Lu said.

 

China, which has the world's largest number of chickens, has called bird flu a "serious epidemic." Outbreaks in poultry are still being reported almost daily.

 

The leadership recently made efforts to be more aggressive and open, after being reticent about releasing information during the country's past outbreak of severe acute respiratory syndrome.