Roche Executive: Tamiflu Is Still Working In Swine Flu

ZURICH -(Dow Jones)- Roche Holding AG (ROG.VX) Monday said that its drug Tamiflu still works in the currently spreading swine flu virus, and that a patient in Denmark who had developed resistance to the drug had done so during treatment.

"Such a development had to be expected, and is no surprise from a scientific point of view," David Reddy, Roche's Pandemic Taskforce leader told journalists on a conference call.

This is a case of so-called drug-induced resistance, which is rare, but it was known from clinical studies that this can happen, Reddy said. Drug-induced resistance occurs when a patient who is taking the drug develops resistance. It differs from naturally incurring resistance, where a virus strain in itself isn't responding to the drug.

This isn't the case here, meaning that Tamiflu is still working against swine flu, and Roche thus expects the World Health Organisation to continue to back the use of the drug, Reddy said.

Company Web Site: www.roche.com

-By Anita Greil, Dow Jones Newswires; +41 43 443 8044 ; anita.greil@dowjones.com

(END) Dow Jones Newswires

June 29, 2009 11:14 ET (15:14 GMT)

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