Another human death from bird flu in Vietnam

HANOI: Calling bird flu a ``global threat,'' the EU's health commissioner called for a coordinated international response as Vietnam confirmed its 42nd human death from bird flu, its first in more than three months.

``No country can deal with it on its own. This is a global threat and needs a global response,'' said Health Commissioner Markos Kyprianou during a press conference in Hanoi, his first stop on a four-country Southeast Asian tour to discuss efforts to contain the deadly strain of bird flu that has recently spread from Asia to Europe.

The European Union has pledged to give US$35.7 million to help Asia fight bird flu, and he said funds will be allocated following this week's first major international conference on bird flu and human pandemics in Geneva.

Putting in place preventive measures ``will be a costly exercise but must be viewed as an investment,'' said Kyprianou, who will also travel to Cambodia, Indonesia and Thailand.

Though he praised efforts made by the government, he acknowledged that Vietnam needs to upgrade its infrastructure hospitals and equipment to effectively detect and contain the disease.

The need for urgency was highlighted by Vietnam's announcement of the death of a 35-year-old man by bird flu. The man, who died at a Hanoi hospital on Oct 29, tested positive for the H5N1 strain of bird flu, said Nguyen Van Binh, deputy director of the Preventive Medicine Department under the Ministry of Health.

Binh said the man was admitted to the hospital on Oct 26, four days after his family bought a prepared chicken from a market near his house in the Dong Da District of Hanoi.

Other family members did not show any symptoms of bird flu, he added. At least 63 people in Asia have been killed by the H5N1 bird flu virus since 2003.

Most of the deaths have been linked to direct contact with infected birds. Vietnam's most recent confirmed death was in July.

Vietnam will launch large-scale drills in the country's three main regions to test bird flu pandemic preparedness sometime in the second half of November, said Health Ministry spokesman Pham Tuan Hung.

Hung said the drills, which include treating patients, disinfecting the environment and operating mobile units, will be held in Hanoi, Ho Chi Minh City, and a major city in central Vietnam.

In northern Bac Giang province, some 60 kms northeast of Hanoi, more than 58,000 poultry have been culled over the past five days in three villages where outbreaks were reported more than two weeks ago, said Than Van Thuy, deputy director of the provincial animal health department.

Groups of poultry deaths were also reported in five other villages in the province, he said. ``We have been ordered to cull all the poultry in the flocks where birds died en masse,'' he said.

Tuesday's Tuoi Tre newspaper reported that Vietnam has ordered 25 million tablets of the antiviral drug Tamiflu from Swiss-based Roche Holding AG, enough to treat 2.5 million people.

The newspaper quoted Cao Minh Quang, director of the pharmaceutical administration department under the Ministry of Health, as saying talks with the company on a possible license for Vietnam to produce a generic version of the drug were still inconclusive.

Last month, Quang said Vietnam would go ahead and produce a generic version of Tamiflu with or without Roche's permission. Tamiflu is one of the few drugs that is believed to be effective against bird flu.

sorce: timesindia