Developing countries, particularly Egypt and Indonesia, have become complacent about the lethal strain of bird flu, hindering efforts to eradicate it, a UN health official said.

'The problem we have is mainly in the backyards of poor families in Indonesia and Egypt,' Bernard Vallat, director general of the World Organisation for Animal Health (OIE), said on Friday.

Almost half of the reported deaths from the H5N1 strain of bird flu have occurred in Indonesia, according to WHO data. Egypt has been the worst-hit country outside of Asia, with 22 deaths from 50 reported cases.

In an interview, Vallat said farmers in affected countries no longer treat the virus with the same urgency as when it first appeared.

'Now there is fatigue, and the solution is to have new incentives for these people to co-operate with veterinary services in the field of disease policy implementation,' Vallat said.

If the indifference could be overcome, effective control of the virus - which has killed 245 people and caused the culling of countless birds - was attainable within three years.

'In a perfect world, three years are sufficient if all services are available and incentives are provided for poultry owners to co-operate,' he said.

This week the United Nations and the World Bank said international efforts had limited the spread of bird flu but the risk remained of a global influenza pandemic killing millions.

Most countries now have plans to combat a pandemic, but many of the plans are defective, the UN-World Bank report said.

The World Bank estimates that a global pandemic resulting from the mutation of bird flu could cost $3 trillion and result in a nearly 5 percent drop in world gross domestic product.

In Egypt, about 5 million households rely on poultry as a main source of food and income, and the government has said this makes it unlikely the disease can be eradicated, despite a large-scale poultry vaccination programme.

Eradication programmes often do not succeed because farmers fear a loss of revenue from reporting an outbreak, Vallat said.

China and Vietnam, which have both controlled outbreaks with extensive vaccination programmes, should not consider this a problem solved, he added.

'Vaccination is not the solution for the full eradication of the pathogen,' Vallat said.

Instead, vaccination should be completed within three to four years and in the case of another outbreak affected birds immediately culled, farmers compensated and a 'ring fence' of targeted vaccinations put in place.

The head of the OIE was speaking ahead of a ministerial conference in the Red Sea resort town of Sharm el-Sheikh, where health and agriculture ministers from some 60 countries will seek to formulate a global plan to prepare for, and respond to, the threat of avian flu and other emerging infectious diseases.-Reuters