Bird Flu fears rise, vaccine may still be six months away

In trying to avoid an international bird flu pandemic, the World Health organsisation has pledged to work flat out with drug and research companies to develop a vaccine for the current strain of the avian flu.

In trying to avoid an international bird flu pandemic, the World Health organsisation has pledged to work flat out with drug and research companies to develop a vaccine for the current strain of the avian flu.Senior WHO officials said they would hold talks next week with vaccine manufacturers and licensing agencies to coordinate clinical trials. The bird flu outbreak in Asia, which is now seriously being considered potentially more dangerous and capable of a world wide epidemic worse than that of Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome (SARS), has appeared in a number of countries including Vietnam, Thailand, China, Japan and, most recently, Cambodia. Five people have died in Vietnam and two boys from different provinces west of Bangkok were in “critical but stable” condition after contracting the disease. Another death has been confirmed in Thailand. WHO’s laboratory network has already started work on developing a prototype virus, which would be provided to manufacturers as the “seed stock” for vaccine production. “We believe that if everything goes well, it is feasible that in the next four weeks we can give the companies the strain which they can use for vaccine production,” Klaus Stohr, WHOs head of global influenza program.”Vaccine development is the next step, that can take time, normally production could take six months,” he said. The vaccine would be produced with “reverse genetics” technology, which would lead some countries to consider it a genetically-modified organism, the WHO expert said. This could pose a challenge for the drug companies and national licensing agencies, he said. Whilst it may seem ridiculous, some countries drug control authorities may reject the vaccine on this basis.Rules for approving genetically-modified vaccines tend to be more stringent and time-consuming. WHO has also started developing new diagnostic test kits so that countries can investigate samples from humans and see if the bird flu virus is present, Mr Stohr said.