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Progress report: the Taiwan
pandemic flu vaccine R&D programme
Pele Choi-Sing Chong, Investigator and Director, Vaccine Research and Development Centre,
National Health Research Institutes, Taiwan
I
n early 2004, Professor Ih-Jen Su, the General Director of the
Taiwan Centre for Diseases Control (CDC), invited experts
from academic, private sectors and government agencies to a
series of meetings and taskforces to gather opinions and sugges-
tions for formulating a strategic plan for dealing with pandemic
influenza. Three global strategic plans and policies were eventu-
ally recommended to the Taiwan Government: a policy preventing
the introduction of highly pathogenic avian influenza virus
(HPAIV) in Taiwan; the stock piling of anti-influenza drugs; and
influenza virus vaccine self-manufacturing plans.
Under the current Director of Taiwan CDC, Dr Steve Kuo, the first
two policies have been well implemented and no case of human
infection has been reported so far. Taiwan CDC had purchased
and stockpiled more than 2.3 million human doses of anti-flu
drugs, Tamiflu
®
from Roche and Relenza
®
from GlaxoSmithKline
(GSK) – sufficient to cover ten per cent of the Taiwan population.
Taiwan has also built up self-manufacturing capability for Tamiflu.
With the help of local county government agencies, the
Department of Health created public awareness of
HPAIV through media such as television, the Internet
and a hotline (1922 flu Q/A hotlines). In addition,
different levels of drilling exercises were performed in
hospitals, ports of entry and poultry across the island
during the last four years (2005-2008), to ensure each
sector involved was prepared in the event of an
influenza pandemic.
In late 2004, the taskforce for influenza virus vaccine
self-manufacturing plans had several meetings and
concluded that Taiwan needed a flu vaccine manufac-
turing plant to ensure self-supply of flu vaccine during
a pandemic flu period. The goals of the Flu Vaccine Self-
Manufacturing Strategic Plans were:
1. To become one of the world’s top ten flu vaccine
manufacturers within ten years
2. To have capacity for both a self-sufficient supply and
an international health assistant programme of flu
vaccines
3. To enhance Taiwan’s biotechnology competitiveness.
The plans were approved by the Executive Yuan for
funding from the Council for Planning and
Development (CEPD). The Executive Yuan asked CDC
to take the lead in implementing the strategic plans. In
addition, President Lee of Academic Sinica proposed
world collaboration at the APEC meeting, and the
Taiwan Government was ready to contribute NTD600
million in research and development (R&D) for
pandemic flu vaccines. In early 2005, Dr Steve Kuo
invited Dr Chong of the National Health Research
Institutes (NHRI) Vaccine Center to join CDC’s
pandemic flu working group meeting and asked Dr
Chong to draft an R&D programme for pandemic flu
vaccine to be reviewed by the Flu Vaccine Self-
Manufacturing taskforces, and meanwhile to identify
leading experts within Taiwan institutes to coordinate
three areas of activity (epidemiology, international
collaboration in vaccine R&D technology transfer, and
industrialization).
Based on current scientific literature, when a flu
pandemic occurs, 30 per cent of the population will be
infected and 3-5 per cent of these patients will eventu-
ally die. The current anti-flu drugs (Tamiflu and others)
Roles of vaccines in Taiwan pandemic flu preparedness programme
NHRI
vaccine
center
Pandemic
flu R&D
Flu vaccine self-
manufacturing plan
Pandemic flu
preparedness programmes
Source: Taiwan CDC and NHRI