WHO accused of exaggerating bird flu pandemic threat

Jan 23 2006

The World Health Organisation (WHO) has disputed claims that it has exaggerated the risk of a human influenza pandemic.

The agency has predicted that as many as 7.4 million people could die if a pandemic sweeps the world.

Lee Jong-Wook, director-general of the WHO, says the threat of a pandemic is real and the agency is not guilty of exaggerating the case.

Lee was speaking at a meeting in Geneva to the organisation's executive board.

Lee said the only way to reduce the devastating human and economic impact of a pandemic is to take the threat seriously now and prepare for it.

He says the problem is a global one.

Meanwhile China has reported it's 10th case of the potentially fatal bird flu virus. The health ministry says the woman is in a critical condition in hospital.

She apparently ran a shop in a farm goods market in the Sichuan Province.

To date six of China's 10 known victims of bird flu have died.

The WHO has also confirmed bird flu as the cause of death of a young brother and sister in Indonesia this month, taking the death toll to at least 82 since 2003.

Bird flu remains a disease primarily in birds and victims contract the virus through close contact, usually with sick chickens.

Experts have always feared the virus might mutate into a form that would pass easily from person to person, sparking a pandemic.

Only last week wealthy nations pledged $1.9 billion to fight bird flu at a conference in Beijing.

The money will be spent on measures to eradicate a virus which is endemic in poultry in parts of Asia.

Recent outbreaks in Turkey has made it the sixth country to report human cases of bird flu, and indicates the virus has now spread close to Europe and the Middle East.

To date Turkey has reported 21 cases of bird flu, including the deaths of four children, but according to the WHO human cases appear to be decreasing there following mass poultry culling and a public education campaigns.

Apparently WHO experts will help neighboring countries at risk from the virus, such as Syria, Iran, Iraq, as well as Ukraine, Georgia and Azerbaijan, to assess the situation.

Iraq's Health Minister Abdul Mutleb Mohammed Ali has said the region is ill prepared for bird flu and says many lack adequate resources to diagnose and confirm avian influenza.

There is also some difficulty in obtaining antiviral drugs.

Unlike other outbreaks, experts say that in Turkey there has been no prior warning of infection in poultry, which demonstrates the dangers poised by avian influenza in birds and the importance of surveillance and effective early warning systems.