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India, which has developed their own generic version of Tamiflu, says they are depleting their 1-million-pill stockpile at a rapid rate. They are imploring manufacturers to supply more.
This from The Times of India.
Supply more Tamiflu, govt tells pharma companies
NEW DELHI: In order to replenish its fast depleting reserve of oseltamavir — the most effective drug to treat H5N1 bird flu virus infection in humans, the Union health ministry has now written to pharmaceutical companies to supply fresh stocks of the drug as fast as possible.
Under India's bird flu preparedness plan, the Union health ministry had decided to stockpile 10 lakh capsules of oseltamivir (best known as Tamiflu) at any given point of time. But at present, the health ministry is left with 7.5 lakh doses of the drug with a shelf life of five years.
Speaking to TOI, Union health secretary Naresh Dayal said, "Before the outbreak in West Bengal, we had 9.7 lakh capsules of Tamiflu stockpiled. The ministry has already sent over two lakh capsules of Tamiflu to West Bengal over the past week."
Saying that the ministry is yet to finalize which company will ultimately supply the drug, Dayal added, "Since we had decided that 10 lakh capsules of bird flu drug for humans had to be in our stockpile at any given time, we have written to Indian generic drug companies and swiss pharma major Roche to get back to us with rate quotations and the time they would take to supply us fresh stocks. Most companies have told us they have bulk amounts of the drug available. Packing and dispatching it would take a week."
According to Dayal, the Indian generic drug companies approached include Hetero drugs, Cipla and Ranbaxy. Speaking to TOI, Cipla joint managing director A Lulla said, "We can immediately supply the ministry 100,000 doses of oseltamavir. The prices too are highly competitive. We have been supplying to several other South East Asian countries."
The WHO meanwhile has also stockpiled Tamiflu and has three million courses. These will be used specifically for rapid containment at the beginning of a pandemic. WHO India representative Salim J Hebayeb had earlier said, "We have already stockpiled three million doses of Tamiflu."
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