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Fears Trigger Rush on Liquid Tamiflu for Kids

Sporadic shortages reported around the country

By John Johnson,  Newser Staff

Posted Oct 28, 2009 6:06 PM CDT
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(Newser) – Parents are scrambling in parts of the country to find liquid Tamiflu for their kids. It's selling out so quickly in drug stores that federal officials have given pharmacists a back-up plan: They can mix syrup with the powdery adult capsules—the precise ratio is determined by a child's weight—and sell that. There's plenty of the adult version of the drug to go around, federal officials tell the Washington Post.

"For the most part, patients are getting treated," says a CDC official. "There have been shortages in sporadic spots, but generally it's still available." The agency has shipped hundreds of thousands of courses of the drug to states from an emergency stockpile to ease the crunch. The manufacturer, Roche, says it consulted with US and world officials and cut back on the liquid version to ramp up production of the adult capsules when swine flu cases began to rise.

The antiviral drug Tamiflu.
The antiviral drug Tamiflu.   (AP Photo/Michael Probst/file)
Packages of Tamiflu.
Packages of Tamiflu.   (AP Photo/Thomas Kienzle, File)
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COMMENTS
Showing 3 of 5 comments
brawne
Oct 29, 2009 6:01 AM CDT
I'd feel so much better if Donald Rumsfeld didn't own as much of Tamiflu as Cheney does Halliburton. I don't mean some weird conspiracy thing, I just mean that you don't need the cure without the disease. Biology--a virus causes the flu and viruses you should get a vaccine for to teach your immune system to spot them. Tamiiflu is an anti viral drug for symptoms like you have anti-viral drugs for herpes. Would you take them without a cold sore? Or a herpes outbreak or shingles--No. Why worry about this? They are making a market for this--get it? And, and anti-viral will do not a thing for this swine flu in the young and healthy. It is so easy to not get the flu--don't shake hands with anyone and wash your hands thirty times a day with soap and hot water--don't use an antibacterial because they don't kill a virus. AND don't touch your face. And, it isn't even a big deal flu. Get a vaccine for bacterial pneumonia--better than Tamiiflu because the pneumonia is the only bad part. H1N1 means that this is an airborne mildly dangerous flu. Yes, it is airborne so you can catch it from a sneeze ,but N1 means that it is not virulent. That is why the CDC fears it not because of its lethality now--because like any good parasite, it wants to keep you alive and live--they fear that it will land on someone without the flu, full of Tamiiflu and mutate to avoid the anti-viral and that would be N3. So, Rumsfeld ends up killing us all--rather fitting. Except that we don't even know where our Doctor Tripps is coming from, unless like me you read every freaking book about your government. Stop with the medicine unless you have the flu?// Cause if you don't--you'll kill us all. Get a vaccine or get your tamiflu in the hospital when you're sick. We should all be very afraid of this--give a bunch of kids without H1N1 an anti-viral and we'll get H1N3--that is death for everyone--even me who got a vaccine for H1N1--Not H1N3.
IggyJack
Oct 29, 2009 4:03 AM CDT
Stupid "outbreak" propaganda.
chamisi
Oct 29, 2009 1:46 AM CDT
just ask Rummy
Health • US

 
medicine • flu shot • Tamiflu • Roche • swine flu • H1N1 virus

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