Word: oseltamivir
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Doctors soon gave Bonilla an anti-viral drug that is known in Mexico as oseltamivir (and more popularly known as Tamiflu) making his condition rapidly improve. In some ways, the timing of sickness was lucky, he says. Once they had identified swine flu on April 23, Mexican health authorities rushed anti-virals to hospitals and found they were very effective. But many who had started suffering before had already developed severe pneumonia; and for some, it was too late to be saved. The errors in treatment in the first weeks of the outbreak do much to explain the higher death...
...antivirals work? If administered soon after symptoms appear, antivirals Oseltamivir and Zanamivir (brand names Tamiflu and Relenza) are believed to reduce the severity and shorten the duration of the disease by current strain of swine flu. The drugs work by inhibiting an enyzme chemical helper that the flu virus uses to spread from infected human cells to healthy ones. So while not killing the virus, it helps the body fight off the disease by slowing its spread. This, in turn, may help prevent "acute respiratory distress syndrome" - the sudden worsening of flu that, along with secondary lung infections...
...stockpile antivirals. While the current swine flu outbreak remains limited in scope, health agencies will likely offer antivirals as a prophylaxis only to those who may have been exposed to the disease: asymptomatic passengers on the same flight as a sick Spanish man, for example, have been given Oseltamivir as a precaution. In New Zealand and Mexico, where there are confirmed cases of the disease, the drug has been made available over-the-counter, although pharmacists can exercise discretion about who they sell to. Should the outbreak turn into a global pandemic, there simply aren't enough drugs available...
...thrive and be passed on. A similar process has led to the widespread existence of antibiotic resistant bacteria such as MRSA. But it can also happen spontaneously: during this winter's flu season, when antivirals were not widely used, the dominant strain of influenza suddenly became resistant to Oseltamivir. Doctors are uncertain as to why. In a pandemic situation, when the drugs will be widely prescribed, many virologists believe that resistance will inevitably develop - they just hope it will happen slowly...
What can we nonexperts do? Get a flu vaccine every year. No shot is 100% effective, but getting vaccinated gives you a good chance of lessening your symptoms--and thus your infectiousness--should you get slammed with the oseltamivir-resistant strain. There's also hope that a promising antibody--which researchers discovered in February--that binds to a nonmutating part of the virus could one day provide lifetime protection in a single shot against practically all versions of the flu. No more annual flu vaccine and no more worries about the next pandemic. Until then, we just have to hope...