The market for the influenza (flu) treatment ‘Tamiflu’ has virtually become moribund this year. Its market size fell 99.9% due to the rapid drop of flu cases in the prolonged coronavirus disease-2019 (COVID-19) pandemic.

According to the pharmaceutical market data research firm UBIST on the 22nd, outpatient prescription of ‘oseltamivir’ recorded 10.27 million won in the first quarter of this year. This is a 99.9% drop from the 8.3 billion won recorded in the first quarter of the previous year. This is the second consecutive quarter in which virtually no prescriptions were written for oseltamivir, the main ingredient of Tamiflu. The prescription sales amount of oseltamivir in the fourth quarter of last