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Even before China, Thailand and Vietnam reported new outbreaks in chickens in the last few days, governments in bigger and more affluent countries were preparing for a possible pandemic among humans. The United States and European nations have been negotiating to buy stockpiles of Tamiflu, the only drug believed effective for people infected with the A(H5N1) strain of bird flu, and they have been racing to develop an effective vaccine. China is negotiating to buy its own supply of Tamiflu, a senior Chinese health official said in an interview. Taiwan has already bought a large stockpile of Tamiflu, and is seeking to buy more and to set up its own production facilities. In Japan, the Health Ministry is also trying to arrange for domestic production of Tamiflu, which is now made at a single factory in Europe by the drug company Roche Holding. Health experts say that these preparations may not go far enough. Tamiflu, an antiviral, is only effective if given in the first two days after the onset of infection. Since many people with little more than the sniffles would take Tamiflu before it became clear they did not actually have bird flu, the amount of Tamiflu needed in a health emergency could be enormous, said Dr. Roy Anderson, an epidemiologist at the University of London. Tamiflu is a fairly new drug, still under patent and very costly. Its typical retail cost in the United States is $68 for a 10-capsule treatment to be taken over five days. Although Roche sells it for less at wholesale, it is expensive to stockpile and difficult to manufacture

The United Nations called the report ''a frank assessment'' of Thailand's situation and said that the report should sound an alarm and spur discussion of the issue at the 15th International AIDS Conference, which opens here on Sunday. The meeting is expected to draw at least 15,000 scientists, health workers, political leaders and advocates. Health officials have long praised Thailand for preventing millions from becoming infected with H.I.V., the virus that causes AIDS, by acting decisively early in the epidemic. The Thai government has cut its AIDS prevention budget by nearly two-thirds since 1997. Now adequate prevention services are reaching fewer than 5 percent of teenagers and adults too young to remember the heyday of the AIDS epidemic, Mr. [Hakan Bjorkman] said. He also said that condom use was falling among young, sexually active Thais because they considered AIDS a disease of the past and had little or no perception of the risk of H.I.V. Public awareness campaigns have all but faded from view. The United Nations and leading Thai authorities on AIDS urged Thailand to put AIDS back on the political radar screen. The authorities also urged Thailand to consider revising its prevention messages because some old approaches may no longer work among a new generation

AIDS advocates and health officials have called for wider availability of lower-cost generic anti-HIV drugs to treat the world's 38 million infected people. Many Asian manufacturers are rushing to introduce generic drugs in advance of regulations that could affect the sale of the drugs, the report said. [Joep Lange] said the percentage of infected Thai people receiving anti- retroviral treatment was 'strikingly low.' Thailand has one of Asia's most sophisticated health care systems but only 100 doctors trained to treat AIDS or about one doctor for every 6,700 HIV- infected patients, the report said. Although Thailand has been a leader in preventing HIV, health officials fear that complacency is leading to a new wave of the epidemic. [Kevin Robert Frost] said that he began the study in the spring after observing a spurt in the availability of generics that had escaped the attention of most AIDS experts and health officials. A former AIDS advocate who worked on AIDS research at New York University, Frost said he had based the report on consultations with top health care officials in 15 Asian countries and interviews with dozens of officials in government, pharmaceutical companies and AIDS organizations. Treat Asia's warning follows by a day a report from the United Nations that said that the incidence of HIV in Asia had risen by 2003 to the point where the continent now accounts for one in four of the world's new HIV infections

A World Health Organization official said that the agency was investigating an unconfirmed media report that a person had died of so-called bird flu in Vietnam's Mekong Delta recently and was also investigating unconfirmed reports that birds may be dying of the disease in Indonesia. Hans Wagner, the senior animal production and health officer in Southeast Asia for the UN Food and Agriculture Organization, said he was not aware of any human cases, or of any bird cases outside of Vietnam, Thailand and China

A World Health Organization official said that the agency was investigating an unconfirmed media report that a person died of so- called bird flu in Vietnam's Mekong delta recently, and was also investigating unconfirmed reports that birds may be dying of the disease in Indonesia. Hans Wagner, the senior animal production and health officer in Southeast Asia for the UN Food and Agriculture Organization, said he was not aware of any human cases, or of any bird cases outside of Vietnam, Thailand and China. Thai officials confirmed on Wednesday that they had found infected birds on two farms, located in Ayutthaya and Prathumthani provinces in central Thailand. In China, officials said they had found a single infected bird near Chaohu Lake in Anhui Province, 420 kilometers, or 260 miles, northwest of Shanghai. Vietnam has been killing all chickens near infected birds. In Thailand, the Agriculture Ministry said that it had ordered the culling of all chickens found within five kilometers of the infected chickens

Anti-H.I.V. drugs can vary in purity, potency and the way chemicals are combined. Without adequate quality control and careful supervision of care, the authorities say, the medications may be ineffective or create imbalances that pave the way for the virus to mutate, developing resistance. Two of the 27 manufacturers are in Thailand, where an estimated 84,000 people are not receiving antiretroviral treatment. But the Thai government has exported $3 million of H.I.V. drugs, the report said. Dr. [Joep Lange], the International AIDS Society president, said the percentage of infected Thai people receiving antiretroviral treatment was ''strikingly low.'' Thailand has one of Asia's most sophisticated health care systems, but only 100 doctors trained to treat AIDS, or about one doctor for every 6,700 H.I.V.-infected patients, the report said. Although Thailand has been a leader in preventing H.I.V., health officials fear that complacency is leading to a new wave of the epidemic. Treat Asia's warning follows by a day a report from the United Nations that said that the incidence of H.I.V. in Asia in 2003 rose to the point where the continent now accounted for one in four of the world's new H.I.V. infections

The American nasal vaccine was sprayed once each into four African green monkeys that, four weeks later, were deliberately exposed to the coronavirus that causes SARS. The monkeys showed no sign of the disease in their respiratory tracts, and blood tests showed that the animals had developed a type of protein known as neutralizing antibodies that best correlate with protection from disease. The vaccine was made by inserting the S, or spike, protein that protrudes from the SARS virus into a modified parainfluenza virus. The S protein helps the virus attach and enter human cells. Peter Collins, one of the American scientists, said that immunization with the protein alone stimulated a very strong immune response among the monkeys

Nigeria, with 259 polio cases, now accounts for 77 percent of all polio cases in the world, and health officials are awaiting findings from tests on an additional 85 paralyzed children. The polio virus has also spread from Nigeria, particularly from Kano, in the northern part of the country, to 10 polio-free countries elsewhere on the continent. Kano officials stopped polio immunizations last August when political and religious leaders there claimed that the polio vaccine could make girls infertile. W.H.O. officials say that repeated independent testing of the vaccine have refuted such claims. Dr. [David L. Heymann] said that Kano's governor, Ibrahim Shekarau, told him that he was satisfied the vaccine was safe. Since May, Mr. Shekarau has repeatedly pledged to resume vaccinations. W.H.O. and the United Nations Children's Fund, Unicef, have sent additional workers and have taken other ''extraordinary measures'' to help Nigeria, Dr. Heymann said. Last Saturday, Kano officials began training immunization workers. But in a number of telephone conversations with W.H.O. officials before and since then, Mr. Shekarau has refused to set a date for resumption of polio immunizations

The donor was not suspected of having rabies at his death, which doctors attributed to a stroke, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said yesterday. It was not until this week, after a pathologist in Dallas who was puzzled about the deaths asked the federal agency for help, that the connection was made, Dr. Artun Srinivasan, a C.D.C. physician said in a telephone interview. Dr. Mitchell L. Cohen, an expert on infectious diseases at the center, said in a telephone news conference that tests performed on Wednesday in Atlanta identified a strain of the rabies virus commonly found among bats in all four patients. It is not known when or where the donor was exposed to rabies. A year can pass from when a person is bitten by a rabid animal or exposed to a bat before rabies develops. There is no effective therapy for rabies, which is usually fatal. But injections of two types of immunizations can prevent rabies if they are given soon after exposure. So health officials at the disease control centers and in four states, Alabama, Arkansas, Oklahoma and Texas, are seeking to identify quickly anyone who had contact with the four patients to determine who needs immunizations. People exposed to patients' saliva are those most likely to need treatment

In the same issue, European scientists reported using a different strategy that involved injections of a human monoclonal antibody, a type of genetically engineered protein. The antibody prevented the development of lung damage caused by SARS, reduced the amount of virus growth in the lungs and prevented spread of the virus in secretions from the nose and mouth. Dr. Jan ter Meulen of Leiden, the Netherlands, led the team that included scientists from Rotterdam and Germany. The vaccine was made by inserting the S, or spike, protein that protrudes from the SARS virus into a modified parainfluenza virus. The S protein helps the virus attach and enter human cells