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Thursday, September 16, 2010

US : Swine flu can become drug-resistant quickly

Via Reuters, excerpt :

" A swine flu virus infecting a woman in Singapore mutated into a drug-resistant form virtually overnight, doctors reported in a study that they say shows the limitations of using drugs to treat influenza.

While the woman recovered, the mutation developed within 48 hours, rendering the infection increasingly resistant to the effects of Tamiflu, the main drug used to fight flu and which is known generically as oseltamivir.

"Our data indicate that oseltamivir resistance developed within two days," Masafumi Inoue of the Agency for Science, Research and Technology in Singapore and colleagues wrote in the Emerging Infectious Diseases journal.

The H1N1 swine flu pandemic is over, but the virus has joined the mix of seasonal influenza viruses.

A distant relative, also called H1N1, developed broad resistance to Tamiflu in 2008, and the drug is now considered useless against it. Tamiflu is made and distributed by Roche and Gilead Sciences."

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