2 Vietnamese Deaths Prove Avian Flu Resistant To Roche's Tamiflu (oseltamivir) - What now! RI9

2 Vietnamese Deaths

Prove Avian Flu

Resistant To Roche’s Tamiflu

(oseltamivir) – What now?





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Pact gives bird flu vaccine a production boost
Roche Pharmaceuticals has agreed to a tenfold hike in the production on Tamiflu, the only drug proven to help victims of avian flu, according to an agreement announced yesterday by Sens. Charles Schumer (D-N.Y.) and Lindsay Graham (D-S.C.). (Dec 9, 2005)

EU extends ban on importing birds
BRUSSELS, Belgium // The European Union extended yesterday its ban on importing live captive birds through Jan. 31, citing continued fears about the worldwide spread of bird flu. (Nov 17, 2005)

Change in vaccine production sought
WASHINGTON - Companies are proposing a change in how they make flu vaccine that they believe will improve the nation's ability to fight viruses and modernize the process. (Nov 17, 2005)

China confirms first human cases of bird flu
China reported its first human cases of bird flu on the mainland Wednesday, including at least one fatality, as health workers armed with vaccine and disinfectant raced to inoculate billions of chickens and other poultry in a massive campaign to contain the virus. (Nov 16, 2005)

Poultry sellers: Don't fret
As Thanksgiving Day approaches, some local poultry sellers say they've been getting one additional question besides whether or not turkeys are still available: Could any of them have the notorious avian flu? (Nov 16, 2005)

Roche's Tamiflu may hold promise for staving off pandemic
The race to prevent a bird flu pandemic is on - several experimental vaccines and a drug made from a licorice-flavored cooking spice have snagged key roles. (Nov 16, 2005)

No need for flap over bird flu
There's no denying that the bird flu is very bad for birds. (Nov 16, 2005)
http://www.newsday.com/news/health/ny-bird-flu-sg,0,3742471.storygallery?coll=ny-health-big-pix



 
Flu drug in question
Doctor in Vietnam reports that 2 bird flu patients treated with Tamiflu died; virus showed resistance
BY DELTHIA RICKS
STAFF WRITER

December 21, 2005, 8:44 PM EST

Two Vietnamese patients who were stricken with avian influenza died after their viruses repelled Tamiflu, casting doubts on the reliability of a medication being stockpiled worldwide.

Dr. Menno de Jong of the Hospital for Tropical Diseases in Ho Chi Minh City reports in today's New England Journal of Medicine that four of eight patients treated with Tamiflu died, and that two had strains of the H5N1 flu virus that resisted the drug entirely.

Tamiflu, whose generic name is oseltamivir, is a type of drug known as a neuraminidase inhibitor, which means it blocks an enzyme crucial to viral function. Resistance to Tamiflu had been reported in the recent past. Two Japanese studies found drug resistant viruses in children with seasonal influenza who had taken lower Tamiflu doses than those given in the United States. Doctors in Ho Chi Minh City had given their patients standard doses.

"In contrast," de Jong said of the Japanese studies, "the viruses in our patients were isolated during or shortly after a course of oseltamivir at therapeutic twice-daily doses."

But while standard doses were administered to the patients, two young girls were infected with viruses that were able to repel the medication, allowing the viruses to flourish. Vietnamese scientists dubbed the resistant strains 274Y and found they predominated in both cases.

Drug resistance is a major public health concern and has been most widely documented with antibiotics, some of which are now impotent against powerful bacterial strains. Resistance occurs with the misuse, overuse and abuse of germ-killing drugs. When the drugs are not taken long enough or in the proper dosages to kill the infecting agent, hardy survivors remain in the body and rapidly mutate, gaining the genetic capacity to repel the medication.

Resistance against an antiviral, such as Tamiflu, is a growing public health concern because the drug is one of only two that can be used against superstrains of flu. Tamiflu, the newest of the influenza antivirals often cited because it is effective, can be taken in pill form and is not difficult to stockpile. The other antiviral, Relenza, must be inhaled in a mist.

Writing in a New England Journal of Medicine commentary, Dr. Anne Moscona, of New York-Presbyterian Hospital/Weill Cornell Medical Center in Manhattan, noted that people who are developing personal Tamiflu stockpiles pose more harm than good. Should a pandemic occur, resistance could quickly surface among self-dosers.

"This problem was actually predicted several years ago when scientists found that aspects of the chemical structure of Tamiflu were different than the structure of Relenza," and thus could facilitate resistance, Moscona said.

Meanwhile, Terry Hurley, spokesman for Roche, Tamiflu's maker, said the company takes reports of resistance seriously.

Copyright 2005 Newsday Inc. http://www.newsday.com/news/health/ny-hstamiflu22,0,2605375.story?coll=ny-health-big-pix


The art of creating vaccines a year ahead of the anticipated virus can best be described as a cross between voodoo, alchemy and Ouija board.  I no longer take flu vaccines because every time I did, I got very ill.  I discussed it two years ago with other “seniors” at a Senior Health Clinic, and that opinion was uniformly seconded by other seniors in attendance.

Ouija
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.
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Ouija (pronounced wee-juh or wee-jee) refers to the belief that one can receive messages during a séance by the use of a Ouija board (also called a talking board or spirit board) and planchette. The fingers of the participants are placed on the planchette, which then moves about a board covered with numbers, letters and symbols so as to spell out messages.

Ouija is a trademark for a talking board currently sold by Parker Brothers. While the word is not a genericized trademark, it has become a trademark, which is often used generically to refer to any talking board.
 
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ouija



The U.S. (CDC) Centers for Disease Control attacks a flu that they don’t know exists.  They make the vaccine a year before. There are hundreds of different flu vaccines, so they are making a flu vaccine that they are only guessing will work.  (quotes Dr. Anthony Morris, former Chief Vaccine Controller at FDA: “There is no evidence that any flu vaccine is effective in preventing the flu.  The producers of these vaccines know they are worthless, but they go on selling them anyway.”) The cure is worse than the disease....Louis Pasteur, on his deathbed, renounced his life’s work saying Beauchamp was right when he said, “It’s not the germ, it’s the terrain!”  This means that a mosquito finds a swamp and breeds there.  But if you’re not a ‘swamp’, it can’t breed in you.  The reason we have corrupted immune systems is because we overuse vaccines and antibiotics.  Look at the ads on the 6:30 evening news.  It’s people farting, belching and bloating.  It’s all stuff trying to get out of you.  And then we take medicines that stick it back in.  We treat the symptom and not the disease. – Bill Maher, Real Time With Bill Maher 10/23/04



T.A.B.A.C.C.O.  (Truth About Business And Congressional Crimes Organization)

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