Bird flu drugs 'poured down the drain'

Nearly $1 million worth of antibiotics was being poured down the drain after drugs, bought in case of a bird flu pandemic, had expired, National MP Tony Ryall said.

Health Minister David Cunliffe said in response to written parliamentary questions that the oral liquid antibiotic, Amoxycillin Clavulanate 250mg, which was known to have a relatively short shelf life, had expired in January this year.

These antibiotics had cost $847,875 to buy.

Mr Cunliffe also said that 103, of the 1229 treatment courses of Tamiflu the Government had purchased, had also expired.

These courses cost $300,000 excluding GST, he said.

Mr Ryall said the $847,875 worth of antibiotics was "a fifth" of the national stockpile of pandemic plan antibiotics.

"The New Zealand taxpayer is not only subsidising cheap medicines for tourists and some overseas students, but apparently the country can afford to waste nearly $1 million worth of antibiotics as well," he said.

The antibiotic had a two-year shelf life so it could "and should" have been rotated as Pharmac had promised it would be, Mr Ryall said.

In statement in June 2006, the Government's drug buying agency Pharmac said while antibiotics did not offer protection against influenza viruses, it anticipated the supplies of antibiotics being used in cases of secondary bacterial infections.

It said purchasing the drugs would cost district health boards $4.6 million.

Pharmac's medical director Dr Peter Moodie said at the time that DHB hospitals had agreed to manage rotation of the stocks in order to minimise stock expiry.

Pharmac would also be monitoring stock levels and expiry dates and running further purchasing programmes to maintain the levels of stock as needed.

In this way as little stock as possible should expire, he said.

Former health minister Pete Hodgson today told Parliament that when the country was preparing for a possible pandemic, a decision was taken to have a "surge capacity of, especially, injectable antibiotics and Tamiflu brought into the country in the knowledge that if there was no pandemic, they would be wasted".

Mr Hodgson said the budgetary process for doing so was clear and transparent at the time and was made public.

Earlier this week, Consumer NZ chief executive Sue Chetwin said many people on visitors or students permits were getting subsidised pharmacy medicines they were not entitled to at a cost to the taxpayer.

- NZPA