The government will stockpile an anti-flu drug in preparation for a possible outbreak of the deadly bird flu virus which has hit neighbouring Indonesia, a senior official said today.

"The government has allocated the money. We are adopting a similar measure like Singapore to stockpile the drug," Mazuki Mohamad Isa, deputy director of the Health Ministry's disease control division, told AFP .

Swiss pharmaceutical giant Roche will supply Malaysia with the drug oseltamivir, sold under the brand name Tamiflu, which can reduce the seriousness of the disease and the death toll, officials have said.

"We are in the process of buying the (Tamiflu) vaccines," Mazuki said.

Fears of mutation

Six Indonesians have died of bird flu, bringing to 65 the number of people in Southeast Asia known to have died from the H5N1 strain of the virus since 2003. Vietnam has recorded 43 deaths, Thailand 12 and Cambodia four.

The WHO fears H5N1 will mutate, acquiring genes from the human influenza virus that would make it highly infectious and lethal to millions in a global pandemic.

But it has also urged calm, saying investigations in Indonesia had produced no evidence that H5N1 was spreading easily from person to person.