A Reminder of Our Arrogance with Chemistry
So no surprise Heath's death is still on my mind this morning. I was reading further into it, and whatever the cause of death, he was taking a drug called Ambien [source], which has had many harsh side effectsThis is the very reason I am so distrusting of science, and our need for a quick fix for everything. How is something like this on the market
( Read more... )
"In controlled trials, <1% of adults with insomnia who received zolpidem reported hallucinations."
Thats less than one percent of the 1700 people they tested. Of those 1700, only 4% stopped the test because of adverse effects. Thats a 96% success rate. And that's only using a small sample size. How much closer would you like it to be?
You can go only so far, sampling the population. At some point, to truly test a drug, you need to go more widespread.
To go further, The most widespread side effect during trials was a headache and it was reported almost equally across both the drug and placebo trials.
As far as I can tell, the FDA stiffened the warnings because of one court case in Mass where a man was aquitted of manslaughter on an "Ambien induced " defense. There may be more, but I've searched for an hour and thats all I've been able to dig up on death rates associated with sleeping drugs (excluding suicides, of course).
To throw another drug out there, Gardasil is in a similar situation. We know at least one person who experienced severe side effects associated with taking the vaccine. Clinical studies involving over 21,000 people over 4 years did not turn up the symptoms that that person had. In the end, it's a representative sample of the population.
Which of our rights are being violated? Our right to know the side effects of the drugs we're taking? How much more than printing warnings and handing out pamphlets with recommended usage with every purchase can a company do? It can't MAKE the customer read them.
Finally, the government warning to Aventis was in regards to a single drug trial (Amoxicillin not Ambien) and referred to only one clinical investigator that participated in that trial. It is also the only time in the 10 years worth of history the FDA keeps online that they've received one. http://www.fda.gov/cder/warn/index.htm
Reply
Leave a comment