Canada will add to its arsenal against pandemic influenza by stockpiling large amounts of an inexpensive anti-viral drug called amantadine, Canada´s Public Health Agency revealed Thursday.

    Dr. David Butler-Jones, the head of the agency told local reporters that the agency had been considering buying as many as 16 million doses of amantadine to add to the national emergency drug stockpile.

    Canadian Health Minister Ujjal Dosanjh announced earlier this month that the federal government is purchasing 960,000 treatment courses of oseltamivir, which is sold under the brand name Tamiflu.

    Still, Butler-Jones believes it is prudent to add amantadine tothe stockpile as well, because the strain that eventually triggersthe next pandemic could be an entirely different strain of influenza or a hybrid of the current H5N1 that is susceptible to the drug.