Special Report:  World Tackles Swine Flu

Photo taken on April 30, 2009 shows the scene of a press conference held by the State Council Information Office of China in Beijing, China. The State Council on Tuesday announced the establishment of a "direct reporting system" of swine flu and pledged that the government would "report to the public the latest news on swine flu promptly."  (Xinhua/Chen Shugen) Photo Gallery>>>

    BEIJING, April 30 (Xinhua) -- China has developed an effective method for the instant diagnosis of possible H1N1 influenza epidemic (swine flu), said Health Minister Chen Zhu at a news conference Thursday.

    The new detection method will be installed at the disease control and prevention offices across the country, Chen said.

    Experts and scientists from the Chinese Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) and the Chinese Academy of Medical Sciences have contributed greatly to the research work, Chen added.

    "Experts from the United States and the World Health Organization (WHO) also gave us great help in research," he said.

    The method is a testing chemical reagent, and it will be provided to local CDC offices as soon as possible, a Health Ministry official told Xinhua.

    As soon as China got the warning from the WHO about the possible worldwide outbreak of the disease, research work began for an effective diagnostic method for quick detection, Chen said.

    Chen said China has asked the WHO, and some disease-hit countries to get the virus strain of the variant H1N1, which is crucial in ongoing vaccine research.

    Li Dexin, a CDC senior official, told Xinhua that the WHO might provide the virus strain in mid May, which would be a great improvement to the vaccine development.

    He also revealed that the country has ordered all companies capable of vaccine production to make preparations for production.

    "Once we get the H1N1 virus strain, it's possible to produce the vaccine in three months," Li said.

    The Health Minister also revealed that the government has mandated an increased production of Tamiflu and other antivirals to cope with possible human-infected cases of H1N1 influenza or its variants.

    "The State Council and other governmental sectors have taken measures to increase the antivirals stockpile and China has sufficient domestic production capacity," said Chen.

    Chen said Tamiflu and other anti-influenza medicines had proved effective in clinical treatment to counter the new strain of the H1N1 virus, and the country had a stockpile of the medicine since the bird flu outbreak.

    China has no reported human-infected H1N1 cases. But Chen Zhu said the possibility of the epidemic's entering China could not be ruled out as its global spread has prompted the World Health Organization raise the pandemic alert from Level Four to Level Five.

    The Health Ministry issued and distributed a guideline of diagnosis for H1N1 and its variants to health departments nationwide, mandating local authorities to train medical personnel as soon as possible.

    The guideline says the H1N1 strain, suspected of killing more than 150 people in North America, is a variant of swine influenza and could be spread through the air with human-to-human transmission ability.

    "I have noticed the improvement in terms of capacity of China's official agencies to extend the system for protection and treatment of infectious diseases in the past several years," said Dr. Cris Tunon, senior program officer with the WHO China.

    "We have worked with Chinese government to make sure that we implement the lessons learnt in SARS experience," Tunon told Xinhua.

    "In the case of swine flu, the WHO has received minute response from the Chinese government to communicate and share relevant information, and the relation is quite positive," he said.

    Sha Zukang, Undersecretary-General of the United Nations, praised the Chinese government by saying that it had responded quickly to the WHO's alert of the epidemic.

    "The Chinese government has learned a lesson from the SARS crisis in 2003 and has established an effective and efficient health emergency response mechanism," said Sha at a UN Economic and Social Council meeting that concluded on Thursday in Beijing.

    "Only by sharing prevention knowledge with every citizen, the whole country can effectively prepare for possible pandemic," Sha said.

    Also Thursday, the Health Ministry published a self-protection manual on its website for the public, who are expected to participate in group activities in the upcoming May Day holiday.

    The manual, in Chinese, details the basic preparations people must take before joining tours and urges them to maintain good personal hygiene.

    The State Administration of Traditional Chinese Medicine also asked all local health authorities to involve traditional Chinese medicine experts in the health emergency responding teams in order to take full advantage of traditional remedies.

    China "confident" of preventing H1N1 influenza epidemic spread: Health Minister　

    BEIJING, April 30 (Xinhua) -- Chinese Health Minister Chen Zhu said on Thursday that the country is "confident" and "capable" of preventing and containing the H1N1 influenza epidemic, which is believed to have claimed 160 lives globally.

    "After the test of Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome (SARS) and based on the effective working experience to combat bird flu in the past few years, we are confident and capable of preventing and containing H1N1 influenza epidemic." he told a press conference. Full story