NYT The state has stockpiled only one drug, which dates to the ’90s, to fight the disease if it spreads to the human population. One infectious disease expert says it could be an Achilles’ heel someday: New York’s plan for fighting bird flu, if it begins spreading among people, largely depends on one drug developed in the 1990s. A newer antiviral drug is now available, but the state has not stored a single dose of it in case there’s an emergency.
The bird flu outbreak has spread through dairy cows in the United States over the past few months. Federal officials have repeatedly said that the risk to the general public is low.
But some infectious disease experts are worried. I asked Joseph Goldstein, a Metro reporter who covers public health and health care in New York, to discuss whether New York has too much riding on a single drug — without a fallback plan.
Why are some public health experts worried that New York State has only Tamiflu on hand to counter a large outbreak of bird flu?
The hope is that Tamiflu would be quite effective in treating bird flu patients if H5N1 began spreading from one person to another. But it might not work as well as anticipated.
In 2018, the F.D.A. approved a new flu antiviral medication. It works in an entirely different way than Tamiflu, so it could be a good fallback if Tamiflu isn’t so effective.
But New York State hasn’t stockpiled any of this newer medication, baloxavir marboxil. It’s sold as Xofluza. To be clear, it’s not certain that it would work any better than Tamiflu. But some public health experts say the state should at least consider stockpiling it. Given all the unknowns, it’s just basic risk reduction, they say.