# 1043
The war of words continues between Indonesian officials and the WHO over virus samples, with Indonesia indicating it may be November before an accord can be reached and samples released.
Of course, all of this was supposedly resolved last April. Samples sent to the WHO in May, we are now told, contained no intact virus. Whether that was by accident or design is impossible to tell from this vantage point.
While China has finally, after a year's delay, sent a few samples; they too lag far behind in providing virus samples to the international community.
While I doubt any of the players in this little pastiche wear completely white hats, and Indonesia (along with much of the rest of the developing world) has valid concerns over vaccine availability, none of this makes any difference to the virus, which continues to replicate, mutate, and spread.
While the world needs to be working towards an equitable method of vaccine sharing and distribution, that point remains pretty much moot until we develop the ability to manufacture vaccine quickly, and in quantity. For that to happen, it will require a global commitment by governments, not piecemeal attempts by private industry.
Until then, these countries are basically arguing over how many angels can dance on the point of a hypodermic needle.
Indonesia rejects criticism on bird flu samples
Tue 7 Aug 2007, 10:04 GMT
JAKARTA, Aug 7 (Reuters) - Indonesia will not resume full cooperation with the World Health Organisation on sharing of bird flu virus samples until a fair mechanism is in place, a health official said on Tuesday, but denied sending unusable specimens.
David Heymann, WHO assistant director general for communicable diseases, said on Monday that Indonesia was now the only country that had not shared samples of the H5N1 virus that drug makers can use to develop vaccines.
He said three specimens Jakarta sent in May to a WHO collaborating laboratory in Japan contained fragments, but no live virus.
Triono Soendoro, head of the Indonesian health ministry's research and development centre, dismissed Heymann's remarks.
"He doesn't understand about viruses. Just tell him to ask the virologists in Japan and let them explain to him," Soendoro said by telephone.
Indonesia, the country worst hit by bird flu with 81 human deaths, has accused WHO of misusing its specimens by sharing them with drug companies without its permission.
Jakarta argues these companies use the specimens to develop vaccines poor countries like Indonesia cannot afford.
Soendoro said in the past Indonesia had shared specimens with WHO as a goodwill gesture despite a lack of a proper mechanism for virus sharing.
"We sent the samples in May good faith. It was a donation, a courtesy, in the hope that there would be a fair mechanism in the near future," he said of the samples sent in May.
"But so far no such mechanism exists. It is still being discussed. If we do it again now, we are worried that we will be deceived again," he told Reuters.
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