Tamiflu Scarcity, Pharmacists Make Their Own Sugary Mixture - NYTimes.com

With Tamiflu Scarce, Sugary Mix Is Not What the Doctor Ordered - NYTimes.com

With the liquid children's version of the anti-influenza drug Tamiflu in short supply, pharmacists are making their own children's version by mixing cherry syrup with the contents of the Tamiflu capsules.

But not just any cherry syrup. The prescribing information for Tamiflu lists cherry syrup made by the Humco Holding Group "a mixture of sugar, purified water, artificial cherry flavoring and some other common ingredients” as one of the approved liquids to mix with the medicine.

Lucky Humco has been scrambling to keep up with the demand. So it's not just boom time for th epharma companies, others are jumping on board the sweet money train.

"Our volume has exploded," said Greg Pulido, the chief executive of Humco, based in Texarkana, Tex. "About 30 days ago we got a phone call. We got another phone call. Then we started getting calls from all over the world."

The company typically sells about 50,000 pint-size bottles of the syrup each year. But with the spread of pandemic H1N1 influenza, also known as swine flu, Humco shipped 100,000 bottles in September alone. In October it is planning to make 400,000 bottles.

The company has had to have some ingredients shipped to its factory by air in order to meet the surge of orders, Mr. Pulido said. Last week the factory worked seven days instead of the usual four. But he said that contrary to rumors, there was no shortage of the syrup, and that he was confident there would not be.

The liquid version of Tamiflu is scarce because Roche, the manufacturer of the drug, is concentrating on making the capsules used by adults and older children, which it says is a quicker way to increase world supplies. The same production capacity needed to produce a liquid treatment for one person can be used to make capsules for more than 10 people, Roche says.

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