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BIRD FLU TREATMENT

November 23, 2005

• China will be testing a vaccine on 100 people. The vaccine was jointly developed by Sinovac Biotech and China's Center for Disease Control and Prevention.

November 23, 2005

• U.S. Health officials have hired Sanofi-Aventis and Chiron Corp. to produce $162.5 million worth of vaccine against the H5N1 bird flu. The U.S. government hopes to stockpile enough vaccine for 20 million people.
• President Bush has proposed stockpiling enough Tamiflu and Relenza for 81 million people. Currently, the nation has only enough for 4.3 million people in stock.

Treatment of any virus is spotty at best. Antiviral drugs are sometimes effective in preventing and treating the disease, but no virus has ever been really cured in medical history. Vaccines work much better, but they take at least four months to produce and must be prepared to each subtype.

According to the Center for Disease Control the subtype of bird flu infecting propel, H5N1, is resistant to two commonly used influenzal drugs - amantadine (Symmetrel) and rimantadine (Flumadine). Two other antiviral medications, oseltamavir (Tamiflu) and zanamavir (Relenza) should be effective, but additional studies are required to prove their effectiveness.

Currently, there is no commercially available vaccine to protect humans against the H5N1 virus. Research studies to test a vaccine against H5N1 began in April 2005, and a series of clinical trials is underway

Updated by James Krider, MD onNovember 23, 2005.