The government of Vietnam has taken new measures to prevent and cope with outbreaks of avian flu among poultry as well as people. In early November 2005, Prime Minister Phan Van Khai urged ministries, relevant state agencies, and People’s Committees of cities and provinces nationwide to intensify fights against the disease.
The prime minister requested the ministries of Agriculture and Rural Development and Health to complete their urgent response plans to deal with large potential outbreaks, and submit them to him before November 15. He also instructed relevant sectors and the committees to develop their own response plans.
Khai requested the ministries, agencies and committees to enforce the ban on breeding fowls in the inner areas of cities and major towns, new urban areas and industrial complexes, limit the raising of poultry in high-risk areas, and help farmers seek new occupations. He also imposed a ban on slaughtering and trading live fowls and cattle in markets in the inner areas of cities and towns, and selling foodstuffs made from fresh blood of poultry and cattle.
The prime minister decided to temporarily stop importing poultry, ornamental birds, and related products, which have not treated by temperature or chemicals, from avian flu-stricken countries. Besides, he urged the ministries and the committees to offer specific prevention guidelines to grassroots levels, and relevant agencies to beef up anti-disease propaganda.
“There has been no evidence about the mutation of the bird flu virus strain H5N1, which allows human-to-human transmission, but the risk is very high. A bird flu outbreak on large scale is not far from reality,” Deputy Health Minister Trinh Quan Huan told reporters recently.
If the outbreak occurred, Vietnam would mobilise all internal and external resources to contain it, he said, noting that the country might have to “use public places like schools as hospitals to isolate and treat avian flu patients.” Ninety-one local people have been infected with avian flu since it first broke out in Vietnam in December 2003. Of them, 41 have died, he said.
At a meeting of the National Steering Committee for Avian Flu Prevention, on October 26, the Surveillance Sub-Committee proposed a plan with actions to be taken responding to three phases of the potential epidemic: pre-epidemic (bird flu outbreaks threaten human health, warning (there are human-to-human transmission of the disease), and large-scale spread.
At the warning phase, Vietnam should monitor all border gates, isolate suspected cases of human infections, and follow health status of people coming to the country from affected areas for 10 days. If the epidemic happens on small scale (some 25 people are infected with avivan flu within two weeks), Vietnam should temporarily close schools, markets, restaurants, international airports, and ports in affected areas and high-risk ones. International meetings should be postponed, and public transport engagement limited. If encountering large-scale spread (over 100 avian flu patients are reported within two weeks), Vietnam should issue the national emergency state, asking all residents to wear facial masks.
At the meeting, Ly Ngoc Kinh, director of the Treatment Department under the Health Ministry, stated that according to the warning of the World Health Organisation (WHO), if the pandemic happened, some 10 per cent of Vietnam's 82-million population would be infected with bird flu, and 1 per cent of the population could die of the disease. In such a scenario, the country would lack treatment facilities, since it currently has 1,047 hospitals with a total of 127,000 beds. Many hospitals, especially those in districts and provinces, will face shortage of equipment, medicines, protective gears and ambulances, he said.
Anyone who are infected with avian flu will receive free treatment, Kinh said, noting that the anti-viral medicine branded Tamiflu will be distributed to healthcare establishments in high-risk areas. Vietnam plans to make Tamiflu by late this year. "We're negotiating with Swiss company Roche about getting permission to produce Tamiflu),” said Cao Minh Quang, director of the Vietnam Administration of Drugs. Vietnam has nearly 600,000 Tamiflu capsules and 2 million Tamiflu bottles, which are insufficient to treat a large number of bird flu patients in case of pandemic, he noted.
In the long term, Vietnam will vaccinate people against avian flu virus strain H5N1. It plans to conduct pilot human vaccination in 2006. Besides, the government has recently decided to pour VND700 billion (USUS$44.3 million) into vaccinating fowls. The country is importing an addition of 220 million doses of avian flu vaccines to accelerate vaccination among poultry against avian flu strains of H5N1 and H5N2.
Vietnam, which imported a total of 120 million vaccine doses from China and the Netherlands in the first 10 months of this year, plans to complete the first batch of poultry vaccination in high-risk areas nationwide by late November. All poultry in all 64 localities will have been vaccinated by late March 2007. The Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development has worked out a plan to cooperate with Chinese vaccine producers so that they will transfer their technologies to Vietnamese partners. Made-in-Vietnam fowl vaccines are expected to reach the market in 2008.
In the longer term, Vietnam will raise poultry in concentrated areas on large scale, move fowl farms out of densenly populated areas, and build modern slaughterhouses in certain areas, the ministry said, noting that it has recently urged the localities of Hanoi, Hai Phong, Ho Chi Minh City, Hai Duong, Ha Long, Thanh Hoa, Vinh, Hue, Da Nang, Nha Trang, Bien Hoa and Can Tho to enforce the ban on raising, trading and slaughtering in their inner areas.
The ministry has also instructed the cities and provinces to establish concentrated poultry slaughterhouses, close live fowl markets in their inner areas, and build poultry markets far away from places which sell other goods. They must complete construction of concentrated poultry slaughterhouses before 2007. The timeframe for other localities is no later than 2010.
At a press briefing in late October, Bui Quang Anh, director of the Department of Animal Health said Vietnam, in October, detected two avian flu outbreaks: one in the southern province of Dong Thap and another in the southern province of Bac Lieu. Some 400 out of a flock of 600 ducks in Dong Thap, and part of a flock of more than 1,000 ducks in Bac Lieu died of avian flu.
Since early this year, the country has spotted avian flu outbreaks in 35 cities and provinces, which have killed or led to the forced culling of over 1.5 million poultry, mainly ducks and chickens. Previous outbreaks starting in December 2003 killed and led to the forced culling of some 46.6 million fowls in Vietnam, resulting in losses of VND3.5 trillion (USUS$221.5 million).
The Quan
Vietnamese
