Bird flu: Abuse of Tamiflu can create resistant strains, says study

Bird flu: Abuse of Tamiflu can create resistant strains, says study

news.yahoo.com

Swedish scientists say that Tamiflu -- the frontline weapon in any bird-flu pandemic -- cannot be broken down by sewage systems and this could help the virus mutate dangerously into a drug-resistant strain.

(visit the link for the full news article)

This is rather interesting. I thought Tamiflu caused bad effects in teens and kids or something like that. so what of it? Ideas??

news.yahoo.com
(visit the link for the full news article)

As with most Anti-viral medication regimens there is always a risk of viral resistance both environmentally and biologically. One thing that comes to mind, especially with H5N1, is that because it is a subtype of Influenza A Virus it has an extremely high rate of virulence. The mutation rates of any Influenza strain (or any RNA based virus for that matter) are just below the rates of mutation for HIV, which is well known for this. Specifically when we look at H5, or the 5th Protein of Hemagglutinin, we see that even single changes in the amino acids can alter the virus enough to create somewhat of a resistance. On the same hand the 1st protein of Neuraminidase, N1, can change the structure of proteins found on the viral envelope and capsid to become resistant to several anti-viral medications including Tamiflu. With this evidence, it does become clear that environmental contamination through Tamiflu found in excrement could be a possible concern with cross species transmission.

Having said that there are several factors that need to be examined with Tamiflu ecotoxicology, and unfortunately I am unaware of any true scientific evidence relating to this issue. There has been some research done into Relenza (the UK equivalent of Tamiflu) which showed some positives in that it is water soluable and chemically stable, meaning that hydrolysis is not likely to deplete the chemicals, and thus not become mineralized. Other evidence suggests that Relenza is not able to bind with soil sediments, which would lend some credence to the fact that Tamiflu contamination has never been observed.

reply to post by Jazzerman


Thank you for posting this Jazzerman. This is some rather interesting info you have brought forth to my thread. kudos are in order.Where did you get your resource from to make such a well supported comment?^_^b

Glad you found the information helpful. The information is just out of my head...I work in Virology so I study viruses for a living.

That sounds like a rather intriguing career. Does it take many years of college?
After I graduate high school this year, I'm going to major in Animal Sciences and after the 4 year then, I plan to get into the school of Veterinary medicine for the 2 years it takes.. If I go to KSU(Kansas State), I'm going to to get into the Pre-Veterinary Medicine major. I will most likely specialize in finding diseases in animals and finding the means to stop thme. possibly become a gov't vet and go to the countries of the source problem animals and try to solve the problem, but since vet med can go so many diff ways, i may change my area of vet med from time to time but i want to help a wide base of animals not just domestic, ie cats, dogs....

I posted it twice lol. wooops...
[edit on (10/6/0707 by hachiban08]

[edit on (10/6/0707 by hachiban08]

I won't lie, it took a few years, but was well worth it. Luckily I was on a Track/Cross Country scholarship and an Ambassador scholarship so I left college with very little debt. KSU is a good school for Agriculture and Animal Science, I grew up in a small town about 15 miles from the campus so I know quite a few people who went there.

That is really good^_^v
Oh, you live by KSU? Is therer many tornados there? I live in Cali so im only used to mainly earthquakes and flooding haha