Biosecurity, vaccine screenings prioritized for avian flu

Anissa S. Febrina, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta

The Ministry of Agriculture is prioritizing increased biosecurity and vaccinations over mass culling programs in a bid to prevent an avian flu outbreak.

"We will check our current stock of locally made vaccines because substandard ones could actually spread the virus and worsen the situation," ministry director of animal health Sjamsul Bahri said on Thursday.

Avian flu vaccines must meet a certain minimum standard since they are made of unstable, inactivated viruses that if concocted wrong could infect poultry and widen the outbreak.

The move comes after reports detailing local firms with government licenses skimping on ingredients for the polio vaccine and creating substandard medicines that did not protect children.

"Vaccinations should also have been followed up by monitoring procedures afterwards. Vaccine producers often neglect this, and the ministry should remind them of it," said a veterinarian with the Yogyakarta-based Gadjah Mada University, Darjono, in a discussion.

Sjamsul said that currently there were only seven legal vaccine producers and distributors in the country. "Two of them are importers from Mexico and China," he said.

Local vaccine producers are PT Vaksindo Satwa Nusantara, PT Medion Farma Nusantara, Pusvetma, the Veterinary Research Agency and the Bogor Institute of Agriculture's School for Veterinarians.

Sjamsul said vaccinations and promoting biosecurity were the ministry's top priorities, while mass culling remained a last resort because of financial constraints.

The ministry has allocated Rp 134 billion (US$13.27 million) this year to conduct it's anti-bird flu campaign but says any mass culling in infected areas would require more than that budget.

A small cull of livestock late July in Tangerang, saw pigs and chickens slaughtered, burned and buried.

In Thailand, meanwhile, thousands of infected chickens were placed in closed containers filled with carbon monoxide gas before they were buried in disinfected mass graves.

The domestic poultry industry has suffered around Rp 700 billion in losses since the outbreak began in 2003. As of September 2005, there were 143 regencies in 22 provinces declared as infected areas.

As the disease is highly contagious, potential future losses could reach around Rp 1.8 trillion as the country's poultry population stands at 100 million.

"Our most feasible procedure would be to maintain high biosecurity," said Sjamsul. The use of disinfectant and masks was a must among people who had a lot of contact with poultry, he said.

For biosecurity measures in larger poultry businesses, science company DuPont Indonesia, a subsidiary of the U.S. based E.I. DuPont, launched on the same day a disinfectant product, Virkon S.

The ministry also plans to launch on Oct. 16 a campaign for healthier backyard farming with the Ministry of Health and the Jakarta city's support.

Most people who have contracted bird flu here were found to have be living in areas with backyard farms. Backyard farming is a common practice in traditional households.

Five Indonesians are confirmed to have contracted the virus, of which three of them have died. Health authorities say five others are strongly suspected of having the virus. Their test samples have been sent to a clinic in Hong Kong for confirmation.