Study shows virus can resist bird flu drug

A study of Vietnamese victims of bird flu has found further evidence that the H5N1 virus can mutate to become resistant to Tamiflu, the drug that governments across the world are stockpiling to fight the disease.

The report, published today in the New England Journal of Medicine, said that of eight bird flu patients treated with Tamiflu at the Hospital for Tropical Diseases in Ho Chi Minh City in the last year, four died, of whom two developed a resistance to treatment.

The study was published as the World Health Organisation confirmed that two people, a 39-year-old man and an eight-year-old boy, died of bird flu in Indonesia earlier this month. Eleven people are known to have died after contracting the H5N1 virus in Indonesia, all in the last six months.

"This frightening report should inspire us to devise pandemic strategies that do not favour the development of Tamiflu-resistant strains," she said.

"Improper use of personal stockpiles of Tamiflu may promote resistance, thereby lessening the usefulness of our frontline defence against influenza, and should be strongly discouraged."

A spokeswoman for the Department of Health said the Government was "carefully considering" the research but insisted that "the experience is the drugs do work".

"While there is some anecdotal evidence of the build-up of resistance to anti-viral drugs such as Tamiflu, at present the experience is that these drugs do work and that they should work against a pandemic strain," she said.

"They need to be used carefully and appropriately to minimise the risk of resistance. The Government is taking steps to build up a stockpile of antiviral drugs to treat those who are ill in a pandemic, and we would agree with the authors that people should not privately stockpile the drug as this risks increasing resistance."