Bird Flu WHO Officials Praise Viet Nam And Urge Global Vigilance

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Main Category: Bird Flu / Avian Flu
Also Included In: Veterinary;  Public Health
Article Date: 05 Jan 2007 - 5:00 PDT

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Although there has been widespread praise by the international health community for the promptness and thoroughness of Viet Nam's responses in dealing with bird flu outbreaks, the threat of epidemic is still present and global vigilance needs to be maintained. Viet Nam must keep to its policy of being open and public about its methods, and to continue with its mass vaccination of the country's millions of farmed birds.

This was the sentiment expressed by Dr. Hans Troedsson, country director of the World Health Organisation (WHO) in Viet Nam, who drew attention to the greater risk presented by the cooling weather and the forthcoming festival of Tet, the Viet Namese new year, which this year is celebrated on February 18th.

Around new year is when more poultry is handled and moved around the country and slaughtered, in preparation for the festivities. It is also when the weather is the coolest, providing ideal conditions for the bird flu virus to flourish.

H5N1, the deadly strain of bird flu, was found on a chicken farm in Viet Nam early last month, in non-vaccinated birds that had been hatched illegally. This followed nearly a year after the mass culling and vaccination campaign.

The new head of the WHO, Margaret Chan, a bird flu specialist from Hong Kong, and the first Chinese leader of the organization, says that bird flu is still a global threat and that vigilance must be maintained, particularly in the less developed countries where the risks are much higher. She said that bird flu will remain a priority and has vowed to keep up the fight against it.

She confirmed she will come down hard on governments that ignore the requirements to conduct bird flu tests or hamper the progress of vaccine development.

As proof of this, in a recent interview, she told the BBC that she, of all people, because of her Chinese origin, will be in a better position to work with the Chinese government. China was one of the countries to suffer the first outbreak of the new deadly bird flu strain H5N1 in 2003.

Outbreaks of the deadly H5N1 strain of bird flu started in South-East Asia in 2003 and are the largest and most severe bird flu outbreaks on record, according to the WHO. Over 150 million birds have been destroyed, and still the disease is considered endemic in many of the countries affected, which includes parts of Indonesia, Viet Nam and Cambodia, Thailand, China, and the Lao People’s Democratic Republic.

The Republic of Korea, Malaysia and Japan have announced they are in control of their poultry outbreaks and the WHO now considers them to be free of the disease.

People become infected with the virus when they come into contact with poultry, or objects or surfaces that may be contaminated with the faeces of contaminated birds. Most of the human infections have occurred in communities where poultry is kept by families who depend on their flocks for income or food. The birds often run around freely inside the home or where children play.

The normal practice when birds get sick is to consume them or sell them, making it difficult to control the problem. This illustrates the large cultural challenge of enforcing a bird flu control and eradication campaign.

The total number of laboratory confirmed cases of H5N1 bird flu in humans reported to the WHO currently stands at 261, of which 157 of the sufferers died. The countries affected so far have been: Azerbaijan, Cambodia, China, Djibouti, Egypt, Indonesia, Iraq, Thailand, Turkey and Viet Nam.

The latest confirmed outbreak occurred on 27th December in Egypt. Three people from the same extended family living 80 km north of Cairo have died: a 15 year-old girl, a 30 year-old woman, and a 26 year-old man. It is thought they caught the virus from touching sick ducks.

The World Health Organization (English language).

Written by: Catharine Paddock
Writer: Medical News Today
Copyright: Medical News Today
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