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It is true that Asia is one of the most affected areas when it comes to bird flu. The spreading of this problem made specialists to work for developing a vaccine that could prevent the spreading of the virus. Because bird flu was threading them the Chinese scientists tried to develop a vaccine. The Chinese government agrees with its scientists and sustain that the new developed vaccine will cut a key link in the transmission chain of the highly pathogenic avian influenza among water fowl. The scientists that developed the mentioned vaccine were working at the Key Laboratory of Animal Influenza and used a technique called reverse genetics. They have altered the genome sequence of the virus to construct the vaccine that will prove to be effective to both poultry and mammals. It was then taken a decision of administrating the vaccine to fowls in the country’s key water areas. Tests proved that the vaccine will help the poultry population to fight the bird flu virus called H5N1 three weeks after their vaccination. The vaccine will be effective at least 10 months with 4 months longer than the existing bird flu preventive drugs. With its efficiency proved, the Chinese bird flu drug got registered as a veterinary drug. If laboratory experiments and test results are not enough it is good to say that field tests show the efficiency of the treatment. If the ducks and geese have received two shots, they can produce antibodies that might prevent bird flu. These shots will be effective for at least 10 months even against the H5N1 virus. Chinese scientists developed advanced bird flu tests technologies too. Their tests are able to detect H5, H7 or H9 subgroups of the bird flu in only a few hours. The research was done because of bird flu began to mean a more and more serious problem in the last years. Everyone got alarmed when bird flu first occurred in humans in 1997 in Hong Kong. Until that moment it was believed that bird flu only affects birds. The ability of avian viruses to infect humans raised many questions. The conclusion was that if the virus could pass to humans it can mean the next pandemic. The first noticed outbreak in 1997 infected 18 persons and 6 of them died. In 2003 another case is seen, two persons got infected and one of them died. In the Far East 10 deaths have been reported in 2004. T
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