Second, the inability of existing drugs to clear the virus from the body means money needs to be spent on finding drugs that do.
"Prompt antiviral therapy in newborns that begins within days of exposure may help infants clear the virus and achieve long-term remission without lifelong treatment by preventing such viral hideouts from forming in the first place, " Persaud said.
"Prompt antiviral therapy in newborns that begins within days of exposure may help infants clear the virus and achieve long-term remission without lifelong treatment by preventing such viral hideouts from forming in the first place, " Persaud says.
Bird conservationists add that although migratory birds can carry and transmit the virus, it is often not clear whether they picked up the infection from poultry.
Another reason a state is suspected is that the virus is designed to gather information but has no clear monetizing function.
Family members of both children also had flu-like symptoms, but it's not clear whether they were infected with the same virus since samples weren't taken when they were ill.
None of this would be a problem if the drug industry had a wealth of new breakthroughs, but even with new potential big sellers like Pfizer's Lyrica, for neuropathic pain, or Merck's Gardasil, a vaccine for a virus that can lead to cervical cancer, it's not clear that new drugs can make up for the ones that will be lost.
Gemayel says that aside from the giveaway, Roche has a clear marketing message for the new treatment, which combats hepatitis C virus and the chronic liver disease it causes.
Though it is not clear whether that immunological shift translates into a greater likelihood of contracting the virus, there is no doubt that it can result in more severe illness among pregnant women who are infected with it, she said.
In one case, it is not clear if authorities even informed a patient's relatives about his condition after the virus was discovered.
Scientists say it isn't clear whether the drug will work for all groups at high risk of infection because the virus enters the body in different ways in each case.
The truth is that the answer is not clear at this time, and actually doing a study to determine its role in spreading the flu virus would be quite problematic.
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