China to unveil 5-year AIDS control plan
(Reuters/chinadaily.com.cn)
Updated: 2005-11-30 13:31

Bird flu

At the conference, Gao refuted accusations that China covered up human infections of bird flu, but said ill-equipped and ill-trained doctors might be unable to detect cases.

Gao Qiang also said Shanghai Pharmaceutical was in talks with Swiss drug giant Roche to obtain the technology to manufacture the anti-viral drug Tamiflu that can be used to treat bird flu infections in people.

"I am not worried about governments at various levels covering up an epidemic," Gao said. "But I am worried about the inability of our medical and quarantine personnel at the local level to diagnose and discover epidemics in a timely fashion due to their low abilities and relatively backward equipment."

The H5N1 strain is known to have infected 133 people in Asia since late 2003, killing 68 of them. It remains hard for people to catch, but experts fear it could mutate and become easily passed from person to person, sparking a global pandemic in which millions could die.

China has reported 30 outbreaks in poultry caused by the H5N1 avian flu virus this year in 11 regions and provinces, from the far southwest to the frigid northeast, Gao said.

It has confirmed three cases of bird-to-human infections, two of whom have died. There have been no reports of human-to-human infections. 

Gao defended the government, saying official figures announced were "transparent, comprehensive and accurate".

He rejected a report on the Web site of US-based Chinese-language news portal Boxun, www.boxun.com, which listed the names and addresses of 70 people it said were infected in the northeastern province of Liaoning alone, 14 of whom had died.

"Apart from creating social chaos, I can't guess what Boxun's intentions are," Gao said.

China, the world's biggest poultry-producing nation, has culled more than 20 million birds this year in a bid to contain the spread of avian influenza and announced plans to vaccinate billions of birds.

The central government will cover 50 percent of vaccination and culling costs of poultry farmers in central China, 20 percent of those on the eastern coast and 80 percent in the western hinterland, the cabinet's National Development and Reform Commission said on its Web site.

The government has exempted poultry farmers from paying income taxes and agreed to refund value-added taxes. The central bank on Tuesday ordered banks to boost working capital loans for poultry companies and bird flu vaccine makers.