"The public pay great attention to the vaccine safety problem, which should not be overlooked," Wen told company leaders.

    Later Wen paid a visit to the institute researching and manufacturing medicines for treatment of human cases of bird flu. He said he was happy to know that progress has been made in researching such medicine.

    "Currently China's bird flu prevention and control situation is severe," said Wen after his inspection tour.

    "Prevention of human infection of bird flu and safeguarding people's health and safety are the focus of the prevention work," he said.

    The efficient prevention and control work of highly pathogenic bird flu epidemic depends on science and technology, he said.

    China has made important breakthroughs in researching fowl-use vaccines and substantive progress in researching human-use vaccines and medicines, he said.

    He called for new progress in bird flu vaccine, medicine research and production, as well as in monitoring migratory birds.

    China hastened to fight bird flu earlier this month, when a cabinet meeting chaired by Premier Wen decided to set aside 2 billion yuan (248 million dollars) to check the spreading of the virus. On Tuesday, China announced plans to vaccinate its more than 14 billion farm birds. Enditem