The drug company that manufactures the influenza drug Tamiflu is not just involved in the making of the drug but is working with governments and health organisations all over the world in order to make sure that the drug is administered properly and that it gets to the right places where it is needed. In America for example Roche is cooperating with all states to get them all up to speed regarding pandemic preparedness. Roche has also delivered over 21million Tamiflu courses to the federal government as well as taking orders from individual states in the Unites States.

All over the world other governments have been busy trying to get a good stockpile of Tamiflu ready and the demand at one time easily outstripped the supply. This problem has now been rectified thank to the issuing of licences to other drug companies to make the Tamiflu drug on behalf of the patent owner Roche. Tamiflu is now made all over the world and some of the biggest contracts involved the use of a Chinese company called the Shanghai Pharmaceutical Group and also Hetero Drugs in India. Another contract with a drug company called Aspen in South America will provide the Tamiflu for the African region. The likelihood that when a bird flu pandemic strikes it will start in Asia and therefore these contracts were vital for the region.

Tamiflu’s scientific name is oseltamivir and the process of making it is more complicated than for most drugs especially as it relies on getting shikimic acid from a rare plant called the star anise flower that is only found in far flung regions of the world.

Nevertheless Roche has managed to get production of Tamiflu greatly increased with around 400 million treatments being produced each year compared to only about 40 million before the bird flu pandemic scares. Tamiflu to date remains the most effective treatment to beat the H5N1 virus in humans according to the World Health Organisation.