Free Tamiflu made available
ByTHE anti-viral drug Tamiflu will be given free and without prescription to close contacts of swine flu sufferers in Victorian suburbs with a high number of H1N1 cases.
Thousands of packets of the drug have been distributed to pharmacies in Melbourne after Victorian health authorities asked the Federal Government to release supplies from the national stockpile last week.
The Pharmacy Guild of Australia announced the boost to supplies yesterday after Roche — the drug company that makes Tamiflu — said last week that it had temporarily run out of pediatric forms of the drug due to unprecedented demand.
A Department of Human Services spokesman said Victorian general practitioners would now ask each patient diagnosed with swine flu, based on their symptoms, how many people shared their home.
The department spokesman said pharmacies in areas with a high prevalence of swine flu had been chosen.
A spokeswoman for the Pharmacy Guild of Australia’s Victorian branch said the pharmacies had received on average about 100 adult doses of Tamiflu and 75 children’s doses.
