Beazley doubts Government on flu

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OPPOSITION Leader Kim Beazley said today he did not trust the Government to handle the threat of bird flu competently. The Federal Government is considering vaccinating every Australian against bird flu if trials on a new vaccine are successful. Tests on the vaccine, being developed by research company CSL, should be finished by the end of the year. The H5N1 strain has killed more than 60 people in Asia since 2003 and has now turned up in Europe.

Mr Beazley said Labor had been calling for a year for Australia to take the lead in the region and establish a village-level monitoring system for bird flu in South-East Asia. "Because we're the sophisticated power in health terms, closest to the South-East Asian region, we should have been in at source assisting the countries in that area with preventative measures associated with it," he said on Channel 9.

"I don't trust (the Government) on this in the same way I don't trust them on most things. "They've become masters of spin and minnows of delivery.
"So I hope we're going to be in a position when bird flu comes, if it comes around, to ensure that all our people are properly protected. "But it's a Government that's had to be nagged into this position."

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