What is Tamiflu?
Oseltamivir (Tamiflu) is a relatively new antiviral drug. It acts by stopping growth of the virus. Tamiflu works best when it is taken soon after symptoms of swine flu occur – within the first 48 hours. This is the time period when the virus is dividing fast. If the drug is delayed, the virus burden is quite high and the virus has most likely spread and Tamiflu does not work well.
Tamiflu is available as a capsule or liquid. It must be taken for 5 consecutive days when one develops an acute infection.
All adults and children can be treated with Tamiflu, but pregnant women and those individual with chronic kidney diseases should take the alternative anti viral drug known as Zanamir (Relenza).
To date the evidence for effectiveness of Tamiflu is nonexistent. There are not many studies are available which have studied the drug in detail. Some clinical studies show that it works very well for the common cold virus and isolated reports show that the drug is effective for most cases of swine flu when taken within the first 48 hours.
Moreover, there are ample laboratory studies which show that Tamiflu is effective against swine flu. However, there are also just as many reports indicating that the drug is not effective.
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