Friday, May 11, 2007

"Indonesia's Bird Flu Showdown."

Here's a link to a TIME article entitled, "Indonesia's Bird Flu Showdown."

http://www.time.com/time/health/article/0,8599,1619229,00.html

The article addresses Indonesia's reluctance to send their physical bird flu samples to the WHO for fear that the WHO will turn them over to pharmaceutical companies to create vaccines that developing nations, including Indonesia, will not be able to afford.

What is fair here?

On one hand, Indonesia has handed over the DNA codes of the samples, but there seems to be a perception that Indonesia is endangering the rest of the world by impeding the vaccine research and production. But are they really? Is it fair to make developing countries hand over, wait, and then pay for their panacea due to their lack of capacity or resources to do it themselves?

I'd love to hear from all of you.

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