Initial tests of a bird flu vaccine on monkeys in Vietnam have been successful, and tests in humans could be only months away, medical officials said today.
Vietnam is the country worst hit by an epidemic that has killed 47 people in Asia and wiped out many millions of poultry.
Vietnamese researchers injected a vaccine based on weakened H5N1 bird flu virus in three monkeys early last month and three weeks later found the monkeys were healthy and had produced antibodies.
Vietnam, where 14 people have died of the bird flu virus in the latest outbreak that began in December, hopes to have a vaccine ready for testing in humans later this year.
The Thai government said it was considering a US request that a US-developed vaccine be tested on people in Thailand, which is also suffering new bird flu outbreaks although it has not reported any human infections since October.
If the virus mutated into a form that could jump easily jump between humans, experts fear it would trigger a pandemic that might kill millions of people in a world population with no immunity to it.
The poultry virus has killed one man and infected three in northern Vietnam this month, although fewer outbreaks have been detected in poultry.
Bird flu kills more than 70 per cent of those known to have been infected, but doctors say victims can be saved if they are diagnosed early.