Special report: Global fight against bird flu

    HAVANA, July 20 (Xinhua) -- Cuba has established a monitoring system to detect bird flu, the country"e;s public health ministry announced Friday.

    The ministry"e;s vice minister Gonzalo Estevez told a news conference in Havana that Cuba has trained personnel to face an avian flu epidemic such as the one affecting many countries in southeast Asia.

    Estevez said Cuba has invested millions of dollars in the avian flu detection and control program and it is following the worldwide evolution of the epidemic.

    "The threat of a possible worldwide avian-flu epidemic as well as its social and economic impact urged all the countries to be on the alert and to draw out contingency plans to deal with an emergency situation," Estevez said.

    Bird flu is strong enough to infect different mammals, including humans, and has infected 306 people around the world since 2003, killing 185 of them.