In all almost 75 nations have stockpiled the Tamiflu drug...

The Swiss drug maker Roche Holding AG has had a bumper year and most of the rise in profits has been down to the huge demand for its bird flu medication Tamiflu. In all the profits have risen by 33% and were also boosted by sales of its cancer drugs. The figures for 2006 show a net profit of 7.88 billion Swiss francs up from a figure of 5.92 billion francs for 2005. The sales figures were up almost 20% on the year from the figure of 2005.

This big rise in profits is unlikely to be repeated next year as Roche are forecasting that the demand for the Tamiflu drug will be less in 2007 as most governments and individuals who wanted Tamiflu have got their stockpiles in place. The only way that Roche could repeat these exceptional figures would be if a full blown bird flu pandemic was to hit in various parts of the world.

Roche has not been totally mercenary and profit motivated with the Tamiflu drug most noticeably in the fact that it gave over 3 million doses of Tamiflu to the United Nations to use where they deemed fit. They even have said that they would fly the Tamiflu tablets that it donated to any part of the world where it was needed.

In all almost 75 nations have stockpiled the Tamiflu drug which the United Nations has recommended as the best defence against the H5N1 bird flu in humans. Roche were unable to meet the demand for Tamiflu alone and thus they made agreements with other drug companies in different parts of the world and licensed them to make the Tamiflu drug.

Roche have had to deal with many ethical dilemmas this year with the distribution of the Tamiflu drug as at various times they could not meet demand and had to make hard decisions as to where they would send the next batch.