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Joan Stephenson, PhD

JAMA. 2007;297:1646.

	Since this article does not have an abstract, we have provided the first 150 words of the full text and any section headings.

On March 21, Japan's Health, Labor and Welfare Ministry ordered the company distributing the anti-influenza drug oseltamivir (Tamiflu) in Japan to warn physicians against prescribing the drug to patients aged 10 to 19 years because of reports of neuropsychiatric adverse effects in some children and adolescents who were given the drug. According to reports in the Japanese press, the health ministry said that two 12-year-old boys who had taken oseltamivir were injured after they jumped off the second floor of their homes in February and March; 2 teenagers, both 14 years old, had died in February under similar circumstances.

The European Medicines Agency's Committee for Medicinal Products for Human Use issued a statement on March 23 saying that the benefits of oseltamivir outweigh its risks, but that the group would closely monitor reports of safety concerns in Japan (http://www.emea.eu.int/pdfs/general/direct/pr/13456607en.pdf). Last November, the US Food and . . . [Full Text of this Article]