Tonight:
5°c
Did drug make my children better?
Jim Armitage10 Aug 2009
"Don't worry if it makes her sick. She'll be fine after the first couple of doses." That was how the pharmacist reassured me about giving my five-year-old daughter Tamiflu.
Daisy didn't even have swine flu, but her three-year-old brother Ralph had just been diagnosed over the phone since developing a raging temperature.
Half an hour after her first dose, Daisy vomited. We felt deeply uneasy. But it was a one-off, and the rest of the course had no effect on her whatsoever. Whether it did anything for Ralph is another matter. He certainly got better quickly - within a couple of days his flu was little more than a bad cold.
Was it the Tamiflu or did Ralph just get better by himself? We'll never know. The uncertainty revolves around the fact that we never knew if he had the bug in the first place. The public has to trust that medical experts know what they're doing. But when they start bickering, it makes you wonder if they do.
