Bird Flu Drug Mass Production Technique Discovered

creepygeek writes to mention a New Scientist article detailing a new process for creating Tamiflu, an antiviral drug currently thought to be our best defense against the bird flu. From the article: "Making Tamiflu is slow, partly because shikimic is hard to get, but also because one step in the process involves a highly explosive chemical called an azide. As a result, Tamiflu can be made only in small batches of a few tens of litres at a time. But Elias Corey of Harvard University - who won a Nobel prize in 1990 for chemical synthesis - and colleagues have devised a new way to make the drug from two cheap, plentiful petrochemicals, acrylate and butadiene."

Comments

Re:Good News....right?

[Anonymous Coward]

It might be better to just stock up on old-fashioned Jewish penicillin.

Not a good plan. If Bird Flu strikes, chicken will be rarer than shikimic acid.