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more five day courses of Tamiflu

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    Posted: April 15 2006 at 2:55pm

Enough bird flu drug here to treat 15,000

by Rebecca Wightman

THE first batch of a drug that would be used to combat bird flu has arrived in the island � two months earlier than expected.

Some 200,000 tablets of Tamiflu, an anti-viral agent, arrived on Wednesday.
The island now has 20,000 courses of the drug.
Another 200,000 tablets are due to arrive in September, although because the June batch has arrived already, they could come sooner.

Public health director Dr David Jeffs said that if the virus did strike the island, then it was likely it would affect about a quarter of the population � something like 15,000 people.

The quantity ordered would be enough to treat that many people, plus all the island�s essential workers.

He said that it was reassuring to know that Guernsey was well stocked, although the tablets might never be needed.
�The virus has not made the trans-species mutation and it may never,� he said. �It�s a bit like having a fire extinguisher, but no fire.�

Anyone exposed to the H5N1 virus would be given two tablets a day for five days, which would severely cut the length and severity of the illness, he said.

Essential workers, such as doctors and nurses, would follow a different course and be given one tablet a day for six weeks because of their prolonged exposure and the need to keep front-line staff at work.

Dr Jeffs added that it was still unknown if Tamiflu would be 100% effective if there was a pandemic. It has been produced to combat a virus that as yet does not exist, he said.
Chief pharmacist Ed Freestone hoped that the amount of Tamiflu ordered would be sufficient to keep the island running, although there was no way of knowing.

�We will be able to manage a pandemic as best we can, but we don�t know how big a hit we�re going to get,� he said.
�We�ve had to make fairly bold assumptions based on previous flu pandemics.�



Edited by aurora - April 15 2006 at 2:55pm
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