Via Thanh Nien Daily: High doses of new bird flu drug safe in study. Excerpt:
A new drug being developed to fight both bird flu and seasonal flu can be given safely to people in very high doses, BioCryst Pharmaceuticals Inc. said on Friday.
The drug, called peramivir, is still in experimental trials but is considered the next-line drug to fight influenza of all sorts, after Tamiflu and Relenza.
Experts want to have several antivirals to choose from in fighting flu because the virus mutates quickly, and because no drug has been completely effective.
"We demonstrated that you can go to very high levels of peramivir in humans," Dr. Charles Bugg, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of BioCryst, said in a telephone interview.
"We did escalating doses – starting at a low dose and showing it's safe and going until we have a dose way, way above what we think it takes to inhibit the virus. We can go to very high levels," Bugg added.
