News in the last couple of days that Indonesia has decided not to forward homegrown strains of H5N1 to the WHO and instead is dealing directly with Baxter Healthcare for production of vaccines. The worst bit of this, of course, is that there does not appear to be much cross reactivity elicited by the Vietnamese and Indonesian isolates, where the international reference vaccine is derived from a strain isolated in Vietnam. Moreover, while Baxter is supposedly making progress in producing influenza vaccines in cell culture (Baxter's Press Releases, CIDRAP's version), this technology is not yet approved for human use; only research contracts, rather than production contracts, have been let by the U.S. Government for cell culture production. Finally, despite much noise that cell culture is faster/better/cheaper than eggs for producing vaccines, it appears cell culture only beats eggs by a month or two. (Baxter does have a very comendably decent Influenza information web page, which is here.)
Here are a few paragraphs from an AP story, "Experts say Indonesian deal on H5N1 virus jeopardizes race for pandemic vaccine", via the IHT:
Indonesia Wednesday signed a memorandum of understanding with U.S. drug manufacturer Baxter Healthcare Corp. to develop a human bird flu vaccine.
Under the agreement, Indonesia will provide H5N1 virus samples in exchange for Baxter's expertise in vaccine production. Other organizations would have access to Indonesian samples provided they agree not to use the viruses for "commercial" purposes, said Siti Fadilah Supari, Indonesia's health minister.
But that is a major departure from the World Health Organization's existing virus-sharing system, where bird flu viruses are freely shared with the global community for public health purposes, including vaccine and antiviral development. Indonesia has not shared any viruses since the beginning of 2007.
Indonesia defended its decision, arguing the system works against poor countries. "The specimens we send to WHO...are then used by vaccine makers who then sell to us (at a profit)," Supari told reporters Wednesday. "This is unfair, we have the virus, we are getting sick, and then they take the virus from WHO — 'with WHO's permission' they say — and make it themselves," said Supari.
There seems to be a bit of confusion among reporters about whether Indonesia now has an official policy of withholding samples from the WHO, but Baxter is making it clear they don't have anything to do with the decision. From The New York Times' coverage: "A Baxter spokeswoman said the company had not asked Indonesia to stop cooperating with the W.H.O. She added that the agreement under negotiation would not give it exclusive access to Indonesian strains."
In any event, Indonesians feel bent out of shape that they have previously provided strains to the international community, only to be charged for the vaccine when it becomes available. News reports portray this as something of an IP spat, akin to controversy over biomining. From the Reuters coverage:
"The specimens we sent to the WHO have been forwarded to their collaborating center. There it has been used for various reasons such as vaccine development ... or research," Supari said.
"Later they sold the discovery to us. This is not fair. We are the ones who got sick. They took the sample through WHO and with WHO consent and they tried to produce it for their own use," she said at a news conference after the signing of the pact with Baxter.
Supari said Australia was producing a human bird flu vaccine using the Indonesian virus strain, but did not give details.
"I was shocked because I never gave permits to Australia to produce a vaccine using our strain," she said.
"We have been working with Baxter since the beginning and are processing intellectual property rights with them. Baxter protects our intellectual property rights," she said.
...Under the memorandum of understanding, Indonesia would have the right to produce and market the bird flu vaccine domestically. It is negotiating to export it to a number of countries.
Production would be carried out by makers appointed by the Health Ministry.
So, in conclusion, the deal appears to put Indonesian isolates of H5N1 out of the reach of governments and firms with other vaccine technologies, at least for the time being. Finally, in an interesting twist on the distribution of biological technologies, the deal also appears to put Indonesia in a position to become a leader in cell culture production of vaccines, potentially jumping to the head of the pack in the international vaccine market.