MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency

FAO blasts rich countries for slow reaction to bird flu

Wealthy nations have been slow to respond to the spread of lethal bird flu, said the head of the UN Food and Agriculture Organization.

"Governments have sinned by failing to look ahead and have a sense of solidarity," Jacques Diouf told French daily Liberation. The "crisis really began in December 2003," he said, but "rich countries only began to respond when the flu reached Turkey" two years later.

"Developed countries thought that this was going on in Asia, that it was far away, and that we were exaggerating the risks of the epidemic," said Diouf, adding that his agency had "tried to alert the international community" to the dangers.

"Egotism reigns," he said, adding that a global community based on solidarity was a still a "dream."

Diouf recommended the reinforcement of veterinary services on the ground in affected countries and the development of a cheaper, easier-to- administer vaccine as ways of curbing the spread of the virus, which has leapfrogged from Asia to Europe and Africa.

In Geneva Monday, experts began a meeting at the World Health Organization to refine plans for rapid detection and containment of a potential global flu pandemic.

Despite fears that the virus could mutate when mixed with human influenza, it has not so far developed the capacity for person-to-person transmission.

The latest victim of the virus appears to be an Indonesian woman who was five months pregnant. She died Monday along with her fetus while being treated at Sulianti Saroso hospital in Jakarta.

In Austria several cats have tested positive for the deadly H5N1 strain of bird flu, the country's first reported case of the disease spreading to an animal other than a bird.

Poland, meanwhile, reported its first outbreak of the disease, saying Monday that laboratory tests confirmed that two wild swans had died of the lethal strain. The swans were found dead Thursday in Torun, some 200 kilometres northwest of Warsaw. Samples were being sent to Britain for further tests.

Dr. Margaret Chan, who is spearheading WHO's efforts against bird flu, told disease experts meeting in Geneva that the organization's top priority was to keep the deadly strain from mutating into a form easily passed between humans. That could trigger a global pandemic.

Since February, the virus has spread to birds in 17 new countries in Africa, Asia, Europe and the Middle East, she said.

According to the latest World Health Organization figures, the H5N1 strain has killed at least 94 people since 2003, mostly in Asia, and devastated poultry stocks.

"We truly feel that this present threat and any other threat like it is likely to stretch our global systems to the point of collapse," said Dr. Mike Ryan, director of epidemic and pandemic alert and response at WHO.

WHO spokeswoman Maria Cheng said experts hope to isolate outbreaks and establish agreements allowing international health authorities to respond quickly, testing viruses and putting in place measures to contain the disease.