The Jakarta Post, Jakarta

Indonesia says it will continue withholding its bird flu virus samples from foreign laboratories pending a new global mechanism for virus sharing that has better terms for developing countries.

The decision was made Friday after Health Minister Siti Fadilah Supari met senior World Health Organization officials, including acting assistant director general for communicable diseases David Heyman and acting director for the Global Influenza Program, Keiji Fukuda. WHO representative to Indonesia George Peterson also attended the meeting.

"Indonesia will insist on a material transfer agreement before sending the Indonesian strain of bird flu virus to foreign laboratories to prevent them from being used for commercial purposes," said Siti.

"We agree to send the virus to the WHO with new conditions or mechanisms approved by both parties as well as by other developing countries. Until then, we won't share the samples," she said after the meeting.

Siti said the WHO had often been in favor of capital owners.

"The organization sometimes forgets the good of the people in general and we want to change that," she said.

Indonesia and several developing countries from Asia Pacific regions will meet in March to discuss a more equitable mechanism for virus sharing and access to vaccine production.

"Indonesia's leadership alerted the international community to the needs of developing countries to benefit from sharing virus samples, including access to quality pandemic vaccines at affordable prices," Heyman said after the meeting.

He also expressed support for Indonesia's decision to appoint Swiss-based Baxter Healthcare SA to develop human vaccines with the Indonesian strain, considered the strongest strain and responsible for killing 64 of 84 infected people in the country.

"I believe the minister has done the right thing to discuss with Baxter making the vaccines available in Indonesia. That's what every country will do when they need vaccines. They make deals with companies," he said.

The virulent bird flu virus has claimed the lives of 167 people around the world since 2003.

Indonesia's move has gained support and sympathy from many developing countries and several research centers.

The decision to ban samples of its bird flu virus is "understandable," the British medical journal, The Lancet, wrote in an editorial Thursday.

"To protect the global population, 6.2 billion doses of pandemic vaccine will be needed, but under current manufacturing capacity the world can only produce 500 million doses," Associated Press reported Friday.

"In a pandemic, it is industrialized countries that will have access to available vaccines, whereas developing countries where a pandemic is likely to emerge will be left wanting."