Vietnam sees no new bird flu cases in 3 weeks ; WHO wants more data
HANOI - Vietnam said the bird flu epidemic had been in check for the past three weeks but admitted the battle against the deadly virus was far from won.
The statement followed a report saying the World Health Organisation (WHO) needs more up-to-date data on bird flu, which, scientists warn, could mutate into a human-to-human virus and trigger a deadly global pandemic.
Vietnamese health ministry official Pham Tuan Hung said Thursday that no city or province had reported human or animal cases of bird flu in the past 21 days.
"However, the government does not say we are out of the epidemic," he said.
Vietnam, which suffered 36 of the 52 known human deaths from bird flu since late 2003, said twice last year it had brought the virus under control, but recent research showed the virus is entrenched in Vietnam's poultry population.
The disease has also killed 12 people in Thailand and four in Cambodia.
British science journal Nature reported Wednesday that anxious WHO specialists have complained that local scientists and officials in affected countries have been hoarding viral samples and information.
The agency had obtained only very few samples from the dozens of patients who have fallen sick with the H5N1 viral strain since the start of the year, said the report in the prestigious British magazine.
This "refusal to share" data meant the WHO could not say accurately whether the virus is mutating into a more dangerous form, the paper said.
Vietnamese health official Hung said the communist country "always maintains good cooperation with international organisations in bird flu. We supply good and regular information to the World Health Organisation."
On Thursday, WHO's Hanoi epidemiologist Peter Horby agreed, saying, "there have been ups and downs, but Vietnam has been cooperating well."
Agence France Presse - May 12, 2005.
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