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The impasse remains unresolved, and Indonesia vows to try to change the existing system.
Indonesia to press bird flu case at WHO
JAKARTA (AFP) - Indonesia will urge World Health Organisation members to scrap the existing international policy on bird flu samples when the body meets later this month, a senior health official said here Tuesday.
Indonesia is to use the WHO's annual conference in Geneva to push a controversial new mechanism on sample-sharing, the official said.
The sharing of bird flu samples is considered crucial in the fight against the deadly H5N1 strain of the virus.
Triono Soendoro, the health ministry's head of research, said Indonesia, the nation worst hit by the virus with 75 deaths, has wrongly been painted as the "bad boy" in a long-running dispute with the organisation.
"There is no fight between Indonesia and the WHO ... that is why we are going to Geneva next week with 193 countries in the spirit of how we can improve the system," Soendoro told reporters here.
"Why has Indonesia been blamed for being the bad boy?"
Indonesia sparked concern among scientists after it stopped sharing samples with WHO laboratories in December over fears that drug companies would use them to develop costly vaccines beyond poorer countries' budgets.
Indonesia agreed in March to an immediate resumption, after reaching an apparent deal with the WHO to develop a new mechanism on sample-sharing.
But more than four weeks later, samples have not been sent, partly because Indonesia insists a verbal commitment is not enough and must be in writing.
Under the new mechanism, drug firms would have to negotiate directly, including on financial arrangements, with the country producing the sample.
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