European agencies find 14% of flu isolates are resistant to oseltamivir

doi:10.1136/bmj.39482.466019.DB

BMJ 2008;336:298 (9 February), doi:10.1136/bmj.39482.466019.DB

News

European agencies find 14% of flu isolates are resistant to oseltamivir

Owen Dyer

¹ London

The first 150 words of the full text of this article appear below.

European laboratories have detected an unusually high rate ofresistance to the antiviral drug oseltamivir (Tamiflu) in randomsamples of seasonal influenza virus taken from around the continent.

The European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control and otheragencies reported last week that oseltamivir resistance hadbeen detected in 59 of 437 influenza A (H1N1) isolates fromaround Europe, a rate of 14%. In previous years, resistancehas generally been found in about 1% of isolates.

The highest rate of resistance was found in samples from Norway,with 12 out of 16 tested isolates resistant to oseltamivir.Austria and Italy reported no resistant strains, whereas inGermany, the Netherlands and Sweden, the rate of resistancewas less than 10%. Resistance was found in 17% of French samplestested.

In Britain, the Health Protection Agency has reported findingoseltamivir resistance in eight of 162 isolates tested.

Although resistance to oseltamivir has . . . [Full text of this article]

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