Southeast Asian countries agreed to a bird flu action plan presented by Thailand on Monday aimed at helping its poorer neighbours combat the deadly virus.
Officials from Laos, Cambodia, Vietnam and Myanmar agreed to start implementing the measures, such as surveillance of poultry, next month.
"It is hoped the immediate action plan will send a strong signal to the world community that (these) countries are ready to assume their share of responsibility in ... fighting the disease," Krit Garnjana-Goonchorn, the Thai Foreign Ministry's permanent secretary-general, told reporters after the meeting in Bangkok.
The officials agreed on information sharing programmes and to send experts to one pilot country to conduct on-site training for a surveillance and rapid response team, Krit said.
"What we need to do is to translate what has been discussed and achieved on paper into a concrete plan," Thai Foreign Minister Kantathi Suphamongkhon told the meeting earlier.
The H5N1 virus re-emerged in Asia in 2003. Indonesian officials said on Monday that a 30-year-old man who died last month had bird flu, taking the confirmed death toll from the virus to 115 people in nine countries across the world.
Vietnam, with 42 deaths out of 93 human cases reported, has the highest casualty rate but it has not had a human case of H5N1 since November.
Thailand, once among the worst-hit countries, has earmarked $2.5 million to train and equip officials from its poorer neighbours. But Kantathi conceded that the funds fell short of what was needed. "To do much more, we will need the support of our international partners," Kantathi said.
The World Bank and its partners estimate that the global cost of necessary prevention and preparatory programmes could reach up to $1.4 billion over the next three years, the minister said.
The government in secretive, military-ruled Myanmar says it has brought bird flu under control after thousands of birds and eggs were destroyed on hundreds of farms.
In Cambodia, where a 12-year-old boy became the country's sixth bird flu victim in April, the virus persists mainly in provinces abutting Vietnam.
Laos has reported no human cases but it found bird flu among poultry in 2003. Health experts fear the H5N1 virus could mutate into a form that jumps easily between people and start a global flu pandemic.
As basic health care barely exists outside urban areas in countries such as Laos and Cambodia, officials say a human outbreak may not be detected until it is too late.
"Experts tend to agree that avian influenza is now moving towards its fourth phase, that of human-to-human infection," Kantathi said. "Of course, no one knows how and when this might happen, but if it does so, the threat of a pandemic would be upon us," Kantathi said.
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