Singapore and France jointly organized a workshop on the prevention and management of avian influenza for southeast Asian countries here on Thursday.
During the five-day training, participants will be equipped with the knowledge and skills to develop and execute an effective plan to prevent and manage avian influenza outbreaks in health care settings, Chua Teng Hoe, deputy director of technical cooperation and policy in Singapore's Ministry of Foreign Affairs, said at the opening ceremony.
Seven southeast Asian countries are participating in this workshop, with 19 officials coming from Cambodia, Indonesia, Laos, Brunei, Vietnam, the Philippines and Malaysia.
They will also discuss the various aspects of avian flu, including trends and patterns, surveillance systems, infection control and patient management, with experts from Singapore's Changi General Hospital and France's Pasteur Institute, which is based in Cambodia.
The workshop is under the framework of the Singapore-France Third Country Training Program started in 2001, aiming at training officials in this region with skills in areas such as health, governance, national budget management, procurement and crime prevention.
Ambassador of France to Singapore Pierre Buhler said, "France, for its part, has been involved very early in the combat against avian flu through its research centers such as the Pasteur Institute... We have also called upon our experts - some 100 of them - in Asia and Africa to refocus their activities to assist countries in implementing programs to fight bird flu."
France announced last year that it was setting aside 10 million euros (about 13.8 million U.S. dollars) to finance an emergency program to fight bird flu, according to the ambassador.
The Singapore-France program is also under the framework of the Singapore Cooperation Program, which was established by the Foreign Ministry in 1992. Singapore has organized training programs for over 49,000 participants from 166 countries as of June this year, Chua said.
Source: Xinhua
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