November 29, 2004

 

 

Asia Agrees To Intensify Bird Flu Fight

 

Asia is set to take the bird flu fight to the next level after health ministers from 13 countries agreed to intensify efforts in the fight against bird flu.

 

Shigeru Omi, the World Health Organisation's regional director, told the ministers that Asia must reduce bird flu's threat to humans through a thorough overhaul of the way animals are raised for food.

 

"Anything less than that will only result in further threats to public health," he said at the end of two days of emergency talks in Bangkok.

 

Hong Kong's health secretary York Chow Yat-ngok said the city - where H5N1 bird flu first killed humans seven years ago - had shown the way with its security measures on farms to minimise contacts between chickens and people and between farmed and wild birds, and with its market rest days to allow cleaning of stalls.

 

Poultry and livestock roam freely on small Southeast Asian farms, coming into close contact with people and wild animals. Experts say a pandemic will emerge from an animal, most probably a pig, in which human and bird-flu viruses mix.

 

That has not happened yet, but Dr Omi said H5N1 had grown more deadly, striking animals such as tigers and domesticated cats not previously known to be susceptible to bird flu. He also warned domesticated ducks were showing that, like wild birds, they can have the virus without showing it.

 

Bird flu has killed 32 people this year in Thailand and Vietnam.

 

The ministers agreed a six-point action plan that includes prompt and open exchange of information, developing national flu-pandemic-preparedness plans, promoting food and farming safety and stepping up efforts to develop a vaccine.

 

On Thursday, the head of the WHO's global influenza programme, Klaus Stohr, estimated up to 7 million people could die in a flu pandemic in which up to 30 per cent of the world's population would be infected.

 

Dr Chow said: "Everyone is very conscious that the risk [of a pandemic] is much higher now compared to six months ago. If we do not co-operate and share information it will be difficult to control."