WHO admits to “blundering around” in fight against avian flu

The World Health Organization has denied reports published online in the journal Nature that it is being thwarted in its attempts to combat avian flu by a lack of cooperation from the UN Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO; www.nature.com/news/2005/050509/full/435131a.html).

The article claimed that WHO had not received any data on isolates from infected poultry from the organisation for the past eight months and quoted a WHO official as saying that the FAO had not been sharing the information it had.

Peter Cordingley, WHO's spokesman in Manila, said, “It is true that we …