relenza is cheap insurance

For those who have not picked up the report in the SMH:
http://www.smh.com.au/news/national/flu-misery-for-millions/2006/02/15/1139890807089.html

A few numbers on economic impact to Australia and the World of various scenarios surrounding bird flu in pandemic form. Numbers that stretch to over $10 trillion damage or 12% of the global economy. Remember H5N1 is now only 2 mutations away from this stage having already undergone several of the mutations that were required.

Just how much Relenza (and Tamiflu and amantadines etc) are required to prevent the widespread effects? Billions of courses. And we are talking of just millions of courses. None of this will be available to any of us. We need a global ramping up of production in just about every country. If it costs even $100 B and prevents the worst of the effects then that may well be the cheapest insurance we have ever bought as the alternative could be more than 100 times the cost. It is not a figure (and effect) that is even comprehensible to most.

I cannot believe GSK and (more particularly) most governments are unaware of the risk. That is why I still cling to my estimate that Relenza (and soon IV relenza and LANI) will be produced in amounts many-fold greater than 15 M pa. Indeed I will be horrified if production in 2006 is not closer to 200 M (given known capacity at this stage) and several fold higher again next year. Even then supplies will be scarce as each person will need about 12 courses for complete protection. At a knock down price of say $20/course this is a miserly $240/person. Anyone think this is too much and your lives are not worth that much?