Government spent further £49m on Tamiflu despite known doubts about it

Spending more on stockpile of controversial anti-flu drugs that has already cost over £500m verges on the reckless, says MP.

The government has spent an additional £49m within the last year on renewing its stockpile of Tamiflu, the drug which independent scientists say may do nothing to prevent a flu pandemic.

The decision to spend yet more money on a stockpile of controversial drugs that has already cost over £500m “verges on the reckless, given that the evidence base was already very shaky”, according to Richard Bacon, Conservative MP and senior member of the public accounts committee.