‘Virus pulls the Union together’

Governments could agree this June to set up a shared EU stockpile of antiviral drugs, according to Markos Kyprianou, the European commissioner for health and consumer protection.

The Cypriot commissioner told European Voice a majority of member states were in favour of creating, from their own supplies, a central supply of antiviral drugs in case a human variant of the H5N1 virus emerges in one part of Europe.

"There are ministers who have raised the issue of stockpiling and most are willing to contribute," he said.

"The European Commission prepared the basic issue [of stockpiling] for member states to make a decision...There will be progress by the next Health Council: I hope there will be a decision. If a stockpile is to be useful and effective it will have to be done soon."

He said that at February's informal meeting of EU health ministers "all member states who took the floor supported the idea of a stockpile".

"It is true that they did not all take the floor," he added, saying some governments still remained more cautious than others, but that the majority now supported the idea.

Health ministers will discuss the topic in Vienna again later this month (25-26 April) at another informal meeting, before the hoped-for agreement at a Council meeting in Luxembourg at the start of June.

If ministers do agree to create a stockpile, progress towards actually seeing drugs at a central location is likely to be slow, because "legal and budgetary arrangements" would still have to be made.

Kyprianou said planning for a potential influenza pandemic was pulling the EU together. "It is remarkable, this is the first time member states have jointly prepared for a possible public health crisis," he said. "We are all more or less in uncharted areas, but there is a common effort."

In theory a pandemic could harm feelings of solidarity between member states, if travel restrictions had to be imposed to stop the virus spreading.

Questions about freedom of movement in the event of a pandemic, said Kyprianou, "still need to be further discussed".

A highly contagious human virus could mean limits on travel outside the EU, from one member state to another, or even within individual countries.

But, said Kyprianou, these would be "extreme measures, extreme crisis measures".

In the meantime, getting accurate information about bird flu through to all 25 member states may be the biggest challenge. A Commission-led pandemic simulation exercise last week (30 March) concluded that work needed to be done with "a network of member states' press officers, in order to ensure the communication of clear and accurate messages to the public throughout Europe".

Commission food safety advice has so far not stopped poultry sector sales dropping 70% in some sectors since bird flu arrived at the EU's borders last year.

Passing on "clear-cut scientific advice", said Kyprianou, is "a great responsibility for the Commission...we have to find common messages that don't confuse the public".

The sudden distaste for roast chicken or boiled eggs was essentially, he said, just "a psychological reaction, it started even before bird flu arrived in the EU", he said, adding: "When there were outbreaks in Romania and Turkey, people stopped eating chicken in Italy and Greece - that is not based on facts and science.

"People still view avian flu as a human disease: it is an animal disease... I am optimistic that things will get better, consumption will bounce back."

But the Commission is unlikely to start a large-scale consumer confidence campaign to restore faith in poultry and eggs.

"It is being discussed, but an information campaign is likely to be national, not EU-wide...The Commission could co-ordinate the messages and arguments, but we will then leave things up to governments."

"There are member states who have not been concerned about eating poultry," he pointed out, "a campaign could just start them worrying."

Admitting to his own personal effort to shore up consumer confidence, the commissioner: "I don't think I have ever in my life eaten so much chicken."

Interview with the European Commissioner for Health and Consumer Protection, Markos Kyprianou, who was looking for an agreement between Member States' Governments on stockpiling influenza medicines.
Article is part of a European Voice Special Report, 'Pandemics'.