Sharing bird flu virus samples globally

With this gesture OFFLU reiterates its call to the world's scientists, international organisations and countries for a global sharing of virus strains and sequences.

OFFLU was launched by the FAO and OIE in April 2005. Since then, the organisation has been mainly working on promoting its key objectives "to exchange scientific data and biological materials (including virus strains) within the network, and to share such information with the wider scientific community". Under this new impetus, strains will be sent to the US National Institutes of Health for sequencing and depositing on the free-access database, GenBank.

On 14 March 2006, the Scientific Committee of OFFLU, made up of the world's leading veterinarian experts on avian influenza, revised its terms of reference to put new emphasis on the need for further collection, characterisation and exchange of avian influenza viruses, and for the expansion of the genomic database for animal influenza viruses.

Sharing virus strains, samples and sequences is a critical part of the global work on the surveillance and control of the highly pathogenic H5N1 virus, and supports the preparation of human bird flu vaccines.