Maine is one of just two states that have not participated in a federal program which helps states purchase and store doses of the potent antiviral drugs Tamiflu and Relenza. The prescription medications are widely seen as important pharmaceutical weapons against a predicted global outbreak of a deadly strain of influenza, but Maine’s chief public health officer says there’s no money to purchase the drugs.

According to the federal Department of Health and Human Services, Maine and Massachusetts are alone among the 50 states in not participating at all in the program, which started in 2006. DHHS has stockpiled at least 20 million courses of Tamiflu and Relenza so far and is expected to obtain another 24 million courses this year. Each course is the amount needed to treat one person. Of the total 44 million courses, 31 million are available through the subsidized program, which pays 25 percent of the cost while states must pay the other 75 percent.

DHHS is allocating supplies to states and territories in amounts based on population. Maine’s total allocation, based on an estimated state population of 1,309,205, is 195,101 courses, with 137,457 courses available at the subsidized price.

None of Maine’s allocation has been ordered or purchased, according to the DHHS Web site www.pandemicflu.gov. Massachusetts, with a total allocation of 956,777 courses, is the only other state not to have ordered or purchased at least some of the antiviral medication.

Dr. Dora Ann Mills, director of the Maine Center for Disease Control and Prevention, said in a phone message Monday that it would cost the state about $2 million to pay its share of the cost of acquiring its allocated doses of Tamiflu.

“We have not had the funds to do it,” she said, adding that she has requested the money several times.

“I do feel it’s good that the federal government has negotiated a contract rate [with the drug manufacturers], but it puts states in a difficult bind to come up with state funds to purchase these antivirals,” Mills said.

Several states – including Vermont, Alabama, West Virginia, Wyoming, and Hawaii – have committed to purchasing all of their subsidized allocation, as well as some of the nonsubsidized supply from the federal stockpile. New Hampshire has committed to buying 50 percent of its allotment. Connecticut has committed to 6 percent. Of the U.S. territories, Puerto Rico is the only one to order any Tamiflu from the federal stockpile. Puerto Rico has ordered 100 percent of its subsidized allotment.

Antivirals offer some degree of protection against contracting influenza and can decrease the severity of illness in people who do contract it. State, federal and international governments, as well as some private corporations, are reserving supplies in anticipation of a worldwide flu epidemic that public health officials warn is growing in likelihood.

Unlike the annual flu virus that routinely strikes the United States in the winter months, there is no predicting the specific strain of influenza that will cause the pandemic, and no vaccine can be made until the outbreak occurs. The Spanish flu pandemic of 1918-1919, which is often used to illustrate the expected severity of the coming pandemic, is estimated to have killed between 50 million and 100 million people, almost half of them young adults between the ages of 20 and 40.

mhaskell@bangordailynews.net

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