Julphar’s
top official said that the
company had finished formalities
with the MoH and is waiting for
the final approval of the MoI.
“We will be ready to provide the
local market with its needs of
the medication in the coming two
weeks if we are granted the
licence,” Abdulrazaq Yousif,
Julphar Managing Director, told
mediapersons yesterday. Juplar
calls its local product Flu Fly.
Experts consider Tamiflu, or
Oseltamivir, which is produced
by the Swiss drug maker Roche
Holding AG, to be the most
efficient treatment in case of
an outbreak of human influenza
caused by a mutation of the
bird-flu virus H5N1. The virus
has so far caused a deadly
epidemic among birds. “We have
already received requests from a
number of Arab and AGCC
countries to provide them with
their needs of the anti-viral,”
he added.
The company has received
requests from Kuwait, Egypt,
Bahrain, Saudi Arabia and
Algeria. “We have the capacity
and knowhow to provide all these
countries with their needs of
the medications within two weeks
from now,” he added.
Kuwait declared yesterday the
discovery of two birds infected
with the influenza pandemic.
“Roche will be in a position to
make 300 million treatments of
Tamiflu in 2007,” said Jan van
Koeveringe, technical head of
Roche Pharmaceutical, as quoted
in the international media.
Roche’s production of Tamiflu
has already grown swiftly, from
5.5 million treatments in 1999
to 18 million in 2003 and 27
million last year. But the
company has come under
international pressure to ease
its control on the manufacture
of the drug as governments and
companies stockpile it due to
fears of a global influenza
pandemic.
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