Taiwan builds stockpiles of influenza drug

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Taiwan is building up stockpiles of Tamiflu, the antiviral influenza drug, and aims to have enough to treat 4 percent of its 23 million people by mid-2006, a senior health official said on Thursday.

The island is also in talks with Tamiflu manufacturer Roche Holding AG to obtain a license to produce the drug locally, said Steve Kuo, director of the Center for Disease Control.

He told a foreign media briefing that if the need arose Taiwan would begin production without permission. The goal is to have enough stock to cover 10 percent of the population.

"We are struggling to strike a balance between IP protection and national security,” Kuo said, adding that government labs had already duplicated the drug and production by private firms could be ramped up quickly, possibly within months.

Taiwan has so far been spared a serious outbreak of the H5N1 virus, which has killed more than 60 people and millions of birds across Asia.

The island found one isolated case of the H5N1 virus among ducks in November 2003 though infections of the less virulent H5N2 strain in 2004 led to the culling of over 400,000 fowl.

Taiwan signed a deal with Roche last month to buy almost 700,000 doses of Tamiflu for T$400 million ($11.9 million) to boost its supplies from only 230,000 doses now, Kuo said.

Taiwan has also been in contact with drugmakers such as U.S. Chiron Corp. and GlaxoSmith Kline Plc to ask them to set up plants in the island to produce vaccines against bird flu.

Taiwan plans to produce 200,000 doses of bird flu vaccine by the middle of 2006 at a government lab. The vaccine will be for emergency use only and distributed in the event of a pandemic, Kuo said.

Taiwan’s Center of Disease Control believes efforts by the agriculture ministry and coast guard have reduced the risk of infection by fowl, and is more concerned about the disease being brought into Taiwan by travellers from affected areas.

“No one can say they are ready for the avian flu, but when it comes we will fight with what we have,” he said. 

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