Roche says Tamiflu capacity outstrips demand

BASEL, Switzerland (Reuters) - Swiss-based pharmaceutical group Roche on Thursday said the company and its partners had increased production capacity for influenza drug Tamiflu to more than 400 million treatments a year.

Supply now significantly exceeds current Tamiflu orders and the company said it was cutting production so it meets current demand.

Roche said the expansion of capacity meant it could now satisfy "significant additional orders" from governments and companies for Tamiflu, seen as one of the best defenses against a potential influenza pandemic triggered by bird flu.

Roche will maintain the stock of intermediates and active pharmaceutical ingredients and will gear up to full production capacity if these inventories drop below target levels, or if the World Health Organization (WHO) says the disease has evolved to human-to-human transmission.

"We've seen a ramping up in terms of supply," said Eugene Tierney, head of specialty care products at Roche's drugs unit.

The WHO and some national governments have been stockpiling the drug in the case the H5N1 bird flu strain, now mainly affecting poultry, mutates and begins to spread quickly among humans.

Sales to governments in the first quarter were slower than in the previous three months and "this is the first indication we have that government orders and government demand for Tamiflu is tailing off," Tierney told reporters.

The Basel-based company has so far received orders from governments amounting to about 215 million treatments.