New WHO avian flu guideline for Tamiflu

The World Health Organization has issued a recommendation in favor of national stockpiling of Swiss drug major Roche's Tamiflu (oseltamivir) to counter the threat of a possible avian influenza pandemic, triggered by a mutation in the H5N1 strain that would make it easier for human-to-human transmission (Marketletters passim).

The new guidance notes that higher and longer dosing of Tamiflu may be required than previously thought as the optimum therapy for the disease.

The virologist John Oxford, Professor of Virology at St Bartholomew's and the Royal London Hospital, UK "H5N1 has proven to be an extremely virulent virus in humans and in some countries we have seen the need to use higher and longer doses of oseltamivir to gain maximum benefit." He added that existing stockpiles would need to be "re-evaluated."