Health officials in South Africa have said the country must make its own vaccines for the swine flu.

Health officials in South Africa have said the country must make its own vaccines for the swine flu.
 
According to Reuters South African health minister Aaron Motsoaledi said if they don’t, then care for the virus may not be available for South Africans or other growing nations.
 
"South Africa has arrived at a situation where we have no option but to start developing our own vaccine capacity," he told Parliament. "The disturbing feature about today's world has been expressed by the minister of health for Cambodia who noted that the developed world, after producing the vaccine, may want to cover their own population first before thinking about the developing world,"
 
Swine Flu, which has spread to almost 180 countries, is being called a pandemic by the World Health Organization. Twenty-five of the nations hit by the virus are in Africa where over 5,000 cases have been reported; fifteen of those infections have been fatal.
 
"Unfortunately, there is no capacity in developing countries to produce their own vaccines and at the moment all the vaccine production is being processed in Europe and America, with China also in the process of doing so," Aaron added.
 
The WHO has estimated that possible siwne flu vaccines won’t be developed before November. It’s also speculated that they may not be available until April 2010.

-- Sonya Eskridge

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