The Pharmaceutical Journal
Vol 275 No 7360 p132
30 July 2005

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Two million doses of H5N1 bird-flu vaccine ordered by UK Government

Two million doses of vaccine against the H5N1 avian influenza virus are to be ordered by the UK Government.

Manufacturers have been invited to tender for the order, which will form a strategic stockpile for first-line defence for priority groups of workers if a flu pandemic strikes (PJ, 5 March, p258). The hope is that the vaccine will provide some defence while a vaccine against the precise pandemic strain is developed.

However, the main line of defence against pandemic flu in the UK will be antiviral drugs. Roche has been contracted to provide 7.3 million courses of oseltamivir (Tamiflu) by April 2006, with a further 7.3 million courses to be provided as soon as possible in the following 12 months.

The UK influenza pandemic contingency plan sets out an order of precedence for vaccination. If supplies are limited, health care staff with patient contact will get top priority, followed by essential service providers, such as the security services and undertakers. People in selected industries maintaining essential supplies, such as pharmaceuticals, come fifth in the list of priority groups, with the general population coming last in group seven.

The strategy for use of antivirals is currently provisional. But the philosophy will be to minimise serious illness and death, to maintain essential services and to minimise societal disruption.

Last November, the World Health Organization said that governments around the world should pay for the development of possible seed vaccines, to reduce the development time of the right vaccine, once the global pandemic strain had been identified. H5N1 was one of the seed strains the WHO had in mind.

The expected scenario in any pandemic is that the virus will spread worldwide in three to six months and that between 25 per cent and 30 per cent of the global population will catch the disease. Mortality is expected to be 1 per cent of those infected.

Development and testing of a vaccine against the pandemic strain is expected to take from six to eight months.

Research published this month has shown that oseltamivir boosts the survival rate of mice infected with the H5N1 bird-flu virus (Journal of Infectious Diseases 2005;192:665).