The standard response of governments to the Swine Flu pandemic has been to stock up on Tamiflu put out by Roche. It's made Roche billions of dollars in sales. Then we get this disturbing British Medical Journal report suggesting that it might actually be an enormous waste of money. According to that report, it's not that effective.

"We now conclude there is insufficient evidence to describe the effects of Tamiflu on complications of influenza or the drug’s toxicity," one of the researchers Tom Jefferson told Bloomberg. "We have multibillion-dollar public health policies in place that rely on evidence not available for independent analysis."

Not surprisingly, Roche has hit back , claiming the researchers ignored vital information and didn't allow the company to verify the findings.

As 6 Minutes blogger Michael Woodhead says, it does raise some disturbing questions. "If we have indeed spent hundreds of millions of dollars on questionable interventions to tackle an illusory threat, then surely we should have some sort of review to try and avoid this in years to come," Woodhead says.