Reuters reports on how flu viruses are constantly mutating / evolving to escape our onslaught of drugs to fight them :
" Two extra mutations set the stage for the seasonal influenza virus to evolve into a form that now resists three of the four drugs designed to fight it, researchers reported on Thursday.
Their study, published in the journal Science, provides a way for scientists to keep an eye out for dangerous mutations in new flu viruses, including the ongoing pandemic of H1N1 swine flu.
Only four drugs are on the market to treat flu and two, the adamantines, are useless against virtually all circulating strains because the viruses have evolved resistance.
Tamiflu, known generically as oseltamivir, is the current drug of choice. It comes as a pill made by Roche AG under license from Gilead Sciences. GlaxoSmithKline makes an inhaled drug that works in a similar manner called Relenza, or zanamivir generically.
Both can help reduce flu symptoms if taken quickly and can keep the most vulnerable patients out of the hospital, or keep them alive if they are severely ill. But two years ago the common circulating strain of seasonal H1N1 developed resistance to Tamiflu."
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