The big drugmaker is giving the med to all of its 5,300 US employees, many of whom work in Nutley, NJ, where it maintains a sprawling facility a half hour from Manhattan. The decision was announced yesterday during a six-hour meeting on preparing for bird flu, and each employee had an on-site check-up with a doctor and a tutorial before being handed their pills.

“If you plan on planning to deal with a pandemic, you have to do it now,” George Abercrombie, the head of Roche’s U.S. operations, told the audience, which was made up largely of Roche’s vendors, business partners and other health-care companies.

Roche has been making a list of essential personnal and, in the event of a pandemic, expects to need about 15 percent of its work force on site and another 15 percent to work remotely. “We don’t know who may get sick, who may not get sick, so we thought it was important to protect all our employees,” Mike McGuire, Roche’s vice president for anti-infectives, told Reuters.

Roche is hardly the only major company taking such a step. There are others stockpiling Tamiflu for their employees. But Roche is in a unique position - no one else makes the pill. So if a shortage occurs - and there was one in late 2005 - Roche employees will have first crack at fending off the feathery fever. This is called Looking Out For No. 1.

Of course, one can’t begrudge George and his team for saving a few for themselves. And they certainly don’t want a mutiny by the Roche minions. As for everyone else? Look at it this way: presumably, Roche personnel deserve to survive, too. Besides, if they don’t, who will be left to ensure the rest of us have a chance to get a pill that may not work?

[tags]Bird Flu, Roche, Tamiflu[/tags]