The World Health Organisation has put the maker of the global stockpile of the anti-bird flu drug Tamiflu on alert for the first time after human-to-human transmission was suspected in Indonesia, officials said today.
The organisation said that a precautionary 9,500 treatment doses, along with protective gear, were flown into Indonesia on Friday, but the shipment was not expected to be followed by further movement of the drug.
"We have no intention of shipping that stockpile," a WHO spokesman.
An Indonesian health official, meanwhile, said tests had confirmed five more cases of bird flu, three of them fatal.
One of those cases was of a 32-year-old man who on Monday became the last fatality in a human cluster in Kubu Simbelang, a village of about 1,500 people in North Sumatra.
The WHO in Jakarta received word from the Indonesian Health Ministry about the cluster on Monday. The Geneva-based organization put Swiss drug maker Roche Holding AG on alert hours later, said Jules Pieters, director of WHO's rapid response and containment group.
A Roche spokesman said the stockpile, which consists of 3 million treatment courses kept in Europe and the United States, is ready to be shipped at any time to any place.