2006: Bird flu tests on humans

2005-10-17 11:19

Bangkok - Thailand is planning to start bird flu vaccine trials on humans in May 2006 and place stockpile orders if the tests prove successful, a report said on Monday.

The public health ministry has sought help from Japan's Osaka University to make a pilot batch of between 30 000 and 100 000 samples of the vaccine from a seed sample by the World Health Organisation (WHO), the Bangkok Post reported.

Paijit Warachit, director general of the ministry's medical sciences department, was quoted as saying the batch should be ready by early 2006, and the results of the trial known a year after the study ends.

"We have planned for the H5N1 vaccine trials on people to being in May 2006," the newspaper quoted Paijit as saying.

Plans to stockpile vaccine

"If the trial is successful, we will plan an order to begin stockpiling the vaccine. Should an outbreak occur while the trial is still being carried out, we will immediately vaccinate high-risk groups."

Thailand has already stockpiled about 725 000 doses of Tamiflu, an anti-viral drug used to treat influenza, the health ministry said.

The H5N1 strain of the virus has killed more than 60 people in Asia since 2003 including 12 in Thailand, and was last week detected in Romania and Turkey.

Scientists and health professionals fear H5N1 may mutate and acquire genes from the human flu virus that would make it highly infectious as well as lethal - possibly killing millions worldwide as the influenza pandemic of 1918 did.

A high-profile delegation led by United States health secretary Michael Leavitt last week toured Thailand and neighbouring countries to study how Southeast Asia has battled to contain bird flu.

- AFP