TORONTO — Canadian Press Published on Thursday, Jun. 21, 2007 9:07PM EDT Last updated on Friday, Apr. 03, 2009 2:11PM EDT
An Australian researcher says H5N1 avian flu viruses from Indonesia are markedly less susceptible to the antiviral drug Tamiflu than a previous line of the H5N1 family of viruses.
Jennifer McKimm-Breschkin says laboratory testing shows the viruses from Indonesia are 20 to 30 times less susceptible to the drug as compared to H5N1 viruses that circulated in Cambodia a couple of years ago.
Dr. McKimm-Breschkin, who's attending a conference on infectious diseases in Toronto, says the findings are not good news.
And she says they may help to explain the high death toll from H5N1 in Indonesia, where 80 of 100 patients have died of the disease.
A scientist from the World Health Organization says it's not clear what the impact of the reduced susceptibility to Tamiflu means for people from that part of the world who become infected with the virus.
Dr. Frederick Hayden says a lot of factors can have an impact on whether oseltamivir treatment of H5N1 patients is successful, including how much time passes between infection and the start of drug therapy.
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