UN agencies gather to flesh out bird flu prevention strategy

Health, food and animal experts plan to hammer out a strategy this week to ensure that the bird flu virus does not spread from humans to humans -- a possibility that has raised fears of an influenza pandemic.

The avian flu virus, which has killed 55 people in Asia this year, currently appears to spread only by close contact between humans and poultry. But medical experts fear the virus could mutate into a form which can easily pass between people, triggering a global pandemic.

"The virus has yet to develop efficient human-to-human transmission and there is still time for action," said a statement jointly issued yesterday by three UN organizations set to hold a three-day conference of experts starting today in Kuala Lumpur.

There is an "urgent need to address the root cause of the problem -- the interaction between humans and the production, distribution, processing and marketing of animals for food," the statement said.

The conference will be attended by senior representatives and experts from the Food and Agriculture Organization, the World Organization for Animal Health and the World Health Organization.

"The widespread outbreaks of avian influenza in birds in Asia and the demonstrated capacity of the avian influenza H5N1 strain to infect and kill humans have increased the risk of an influenza pandemic," the statement said.

Any flu strain could mutate to cause a pandemic. But Asia's bird flu -- particularly the H5N1 strain -- is of particular concern because people's immune systems have never had to battle it.

The statement said the meeting's objectives include identifying practices in the production and marketing of live animals in Asia that might endanger human health.

The experts will also assess how effectively current regulations on the production and marketing of live animals for food minimize the risk to humans.

Another objective is to provide practical guidelines on how to improve regulatory controls on the production and marketing of live animals for food.

Delegates will also try to identify effective methods to increase people's awareness about high-risk behavior, the statement said.

The WHO warned last week that rare wild birds, now nesting in China's remote Qinghai Province, could carry the disease when they migrate south this summer. It said 5,000 birds had died as of last week, and continued to die at a rate of about 20 a day.

The WHO has asked China to test birds in the area to determine if any species were infected with the virus but not showing symptoms. Beijing said it would do so with international help.