BEIJING -
As worries about bird flu increased, China
quickened the pace of its efforts to secure
supplies of the antiviral drug Tamiflu, and an
Australian scientist speculated that a vaccine
might be available soon.
Scientist sees
vaccine In Sydney, Australian Nobel
laureate Peter Doherty said that a vaccine to
combat the deadly bird flu may be developed fairly
soon, but warned that no one should underestimate
the danger the disease presents. China is
investigating whether three people, including a
dead 12-year-old girl in Hunan province, were the
nation's first known human cases of bird flu,
which has killed more than 60 people elsewhere in
Asia since 2003.
CSL, a
Melbourne-headquartered global company, is trying
to develop a vaccine to combat the bird flu virus.
Professor Doherty, who won the Nobel Prize for his
work in immunology in 1996, said
that
once a vaccine was developed, it would only take
three to four months to manufacture enough to
vaccinate the majority of Australians. "It's
possible that in the not-too-distant future that
we could actually get a vaccine out there," he
said during an address to the Lowy Institute in
Sydney.
The antiviral drug Tamiflu would
help protect people from any type of flu to a
certain extent, he said. But Australia did not
have sufficient stockpiles of the treatment to
cater for everyone. "It should work if we get the
infection in the individual very early," Doherty
said. But he added that if the infection had
already taken hold in a patient, then Tamiflu and
other antiviral drugs would be ineffective.
Doherty said the problems related to
fighting a potential outbreak of bird flu in
humans were both strategic and economic. "How much
do you spend on a potential threat? It is
tremendously difficult to play this game with this
virus because you have no idea how it will
manifest ... and then there is the possibility it
won't happen at all." Doherty, who works at the St
Jude Children's Research Hospital in the United
States, said a well-organized global influenza
network had been operating since the end of World
War II.
But up to 40,000 Americans still
died from the common flu each year. "The problem
with influenza is it is an extremely infectious
virus. Unlike SARS, people are infectious before
they develop symptoms," he said. The Spanish flu,
which started as an avian flu before mutating to a
human flu, killed about 40 million worldwide at
the end of World War I.
Doherty was
awarded his Nobel Prize for making one of the most
profound discoveries of the past 50 years in the
burgeoning field of immunology - a demonstration
that the cell-based immune response requires
simultaneous recognition of self-antigens and
foreign antigens. His research introduced a
clearer understanding of the intricate mechanisms
of the immune system, and its implications
extended to the treatment of many infectious
diseases.
Chinese institute set to
produce Tamiflu Meanwhile, a leading
Chinese life sciences institute affiliated with
the Chinese Academy of Sciences declared that it
could produce Tamiflu if the bird flu turned into
an epidemic. "If the epidemic spreads, we will
produce our own version of Tamiflu," Wu Jiarui,
vice-president of the Shanghai Institute of
Biological Sciences, said November 8. Swiss-based
Roche Holding AG holds the sole patent for
Tamiflu, but under Chinese law, this could be
sidestepped in the event of a public health
crisis. Scientists say it will be straightforward
to produce Tamiflu if the proper materials are
available, although the process is complicated. Wu
said that the institute has the right materials
available.
The primary goal will be to try
to produce shikimic acid, the active ingredient in
Tamiflu, which is derived from star anise, a spice
widely produced and used in China. Wu said the
acid is also found in other plants used in
traditional Chinese medicine herbs. Meanwhile,
Shanghai Pharmaceutical Group Co Ltd said it
expected a "very positive response" from Roche on
its application to produce Tamiflu, which it
submitted recently (see below). Huang Yanzheng,
vice-president of SPG and board chairman of
Shanghai Roche, a joint venture between Roche and
SPG, said it would take about six months for SPG
to mass-produce Tamiflu once Roche gives the
go-ahead.
With public anxiety about bird
flu growing in the country, all segments of the
poultry industry have been hit hard. Prices for
chicks have plummeted 90% in some areas, from 2
yuan (US$0.25) to 0.2 yuan, the Information Center
of the China Feed Association said. Supermarkets
have cut down purchases of dressed chickens and
ducks because of sluggish sales. Wumart, a Beijing-based chain
supermarket, said it had cut purchases by half in
the past two weeks.
Shandong Liuhe Group, one
of the country's leading suppliers of live fowl
and poultry feed, said it suffered a loss of 4
million yuan (US$494,639) last month alone. The
group's vice-chairman, surnamed Zhang, said the
company has been forced to adopt a "zero profit"
strategy this month in the live-fowl business.
Sales of poultry feed dropped by 10% last month
and may see a 20-30% drop in the next few months,
he added.
The price of soybeans, an
ingredient in bird feed, also declined. Soybean
prices at the Dalian Commodity Exchange dropped 2%
yesterday, Bloomberg reported, adding that the
sluggish business has exerted its influence on
American market. It said soybean prices in Chicago
had their biggest two-session drop in two months
on speculation that demand from China, the biggest
importer of the oilseed, will drop as the country
culls millions of birds. Soybeans for January
delivery dropped 9 cents, or 1.5%, to $5.83 a
bushel on the Chicago Board of Trade, bringing the
two-session decline to 3.1%, the most since August
25.
Meanwhile, the Ministry of Agriculture
told farmers November 8 to buy poultry vaccines
only from nine designated drug makers after a
counterfeit bird flu vaccine was found in
northeast China. The ministry revealed that a
bogus bird flu vaccine produced by a biotech
pharmaceutical company in North China's Inner Mongolia Autonomous
Region had been sold in Liaoning province, where
the latest bird flu outbreak occurred. "The harm
[fake vaccines can do] is incalculable," said Jia
Youling, director of the Veterinary Bureau of the
Ministry of Agriculture.
If they contain
active viruses, they could spread and possibly
harm both poultry and humans, he warned. In
addition, even if counterfeit vaccines contained
harmless ingredients, they could increase the
danger of an epidemic by causing farmers to
believe their flocks had been immunized when they
actually had not.
Shanghai group trying
to license Tamiflu Roche is now assessing
an application sent by a Shanghai pharmaceutical
company, Shanghai Pharmaceutical Group (SPG) to
produce Tamiflu under license. If approved, SPG
would become the first Chinese company to produce
Tamiflu, which according to tests is effective
against bird flu in humans.
"We made the
application in view of the growing demand for the
drug and its high price," said Huang Yanzheng,
vice-president of SPG. Developed by Hoffmann-La
Roche Inc and Gilead Sciences, Tamiflu received
government approval in October 1999. In pill or
liquid form, the drug is now available in about 80
countries around the world.
But given the
worldwide shortage of the medication, the Swiss
drug-maker was criticized because it would not
give up its patent, which is reportedly protected
until 2016, and only recently voiced willingness
to work with others to produce it. Currently, all
the Tamiflu available in China is imported through
Shanghai Roche Pharmaceutical Ltd. Priced at 298
yuan ($37) per 10 granules, the drug is now being
purchased only through the government, an
indicator of stringent supply.
Domestically produced Tamiflu could be, in
theory, as much as 30% cheaper than imports, said
Zhou Qianjun, a doctor with Shanghai No 1 People's
Hospital. "Yet domestic consumers might not
benefit from the cost savings, as there is the
possibility that SPG will monopolize the
business," Zhou added.
Roche headquarters
will carry out an intensive evaluation of SGP's
capabilities, including its raw materials,
facilities and processes, Xu Chao, corporate
communications manager of Roche's Shanghai office,
said after the application was made. Huang said
SGP is gearing up for the coming evaluation.
Declining to reveal more details, he said: "I will
be able to provide better answers in two to three
weeks."
The application came after a
verbal exchange between the top management of the
two companies when Roche's chairman and chief
executive officer Franz Humer paid a visit to
Shanghai last week. Humer revealed during his trip
that Roche was in talks with a number of Chinese
authorities about jointly producing Tamiflu to
boost its global production, amid fears supplies
will fall short of what will be needed in the
event of a flu pandemic. The company itself
expects to increase production tenfold by
mid-2006, according to Roche's Shanghai office.
China reported 50 bird flu outbreaks last
year, but no humans were infected by the virus,
authorities said. Since autumn this year, the H5N1
bird flu strain has been reported in Central
China's Hunan province, east China's Anhui province and the
Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region.
In
another development, China and the United States
pledged to step up technological cooperation and
information exchange in the fight against bird flu
at a recent seminar in Beijing. The two countries
agreed to enhance their coordination and
understanding in adopting international standards
to properly resolve quarantine issues to
facilitate the trade of poultry products.
At the same time they should endeavor to
ensure their quality and safety, according to a
statement from the gathering, which was attended
by officials from the General Administration of
Quality Supervision, Inspection and Quarantine of
China and the US Department of Agriculture.
