State begins to supply stockpile of medicine

• By SANDY DAVIS AND JEREMY HARPER
• Advocate staff writers
• Published: May 2, 2009 - Page: 1A

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Gov. Bobby Jindal’s office announced Friday that health officials are investigating another possible case of swine flu — this time in Ascension Parish — bringing the total number of possible cases to nine.

While Louisiana has no confirmed cases yet, eight samples were sent to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention on Thursday where the agency will determine whether they are swine flu. The Ascension Parish sample also has been sent to the CDC, according to a Governor’s Office news release.

In preparation for a potential outbreak of the disease, the state began distributing its stockpile of anti-viral medicine to health-care providers around the state.

The CDC now has a sample from Ascension Parish, five more from sixth-graders at Cathedral-Carmel School in Lafayette, and one each from St. Tammany, Orleans and St. Martin parishes.

All nine of the samples tested positive for Type A influenza and were sent to the state for further testing. Swine flu is one of the viral strains of Type A.

When the state’s Office of Public Health Laboratory in New Orleans was unable to identify the viral strain of the samples, they were sent to the CDC. The state does not have the equipment to identify swine flu.

It will take the CDC between two to four days to confirm whether any of the nine cases are swine flu, Jindal has said.

State health officials began distributing its stockpile of more than 100,000 courses of anti-viral drugs Friday.

“We are prepositioning the anti-virals in case things get worse,” said Lauren Mendes, a spokeswoman for the Department of Health and Hospitals. “We don’t want to wait until health care ‘runs out’ to make sure they are supplied.”

The CDC earmarked about 669,000 courses of Tamiflu or Relenza treatment for Louisiana and shipped 25 percent of those to the state this week. It is this stockpile that will be distributed, Mendes said.

The state also has a stockpile of its own, totaling about 360,000 courses of treatment for adults, and approximately 60,000 pediatric courses. For now, the state is keeping this stockpile in tact, Mendes said.

The National Guard will deliver the medicine to health providers today in communities throughout Louisiana, Mendes said.

DHH also announced Friday that it tightened its policy on who’s eligible to get the prescription drugs Tamiflu and Relenza.