Adverse Effects of Chantix
Monday, February 04, 2008
Chantix is a prescription anti-smoking drug manufactured by Pfizer, one of the biggest pharmaceutical giants in our society today.
Smoking has been referred to as a silent killer in our society. It has claimed the lives of countless people, and over the years there have been a variety of different techniques developed and used to try and help people kick their smoking habit.
Pfizer has been very aggressive in their attempts to promote Chantix. They have come out with commercials on television that try to reach out to the consumer and persuade them to use Chantix. Their message however does not sufficiently inform the consumer that by using Chantix a person can end up causing deadly harm to him or herself. Their message does not properly convey the risks of this medication.
Chantix was approved in 2006. Here's how it's supposed to work: when a person smokes, the nicotine that they inhale gets attached to receptors in the brain. That in turn produces a chain of chemical reactions including the release of dopamine. Chantix is supposed to prevent nicotine from attaching to these receptors in the brain and thus help people stop smoking.
While that sounds good the dangerous truth about this drug is that it has been linked to numerous deaths and reports of suicidal thoughts and suicidal behavior in both the United States and Great Britain. This medication is still being aggressively marketed by Pfizer and so the number of people falling victim to this drug increases by the day.
In terms of the history of how the safety issues about this drug came to light in November of 2007 the FDA said that it was conducting a safety review of Chantix after it had received reports of about 55 suicides and 199 suicidal thoughts that were possibly linked to the drug.
The preliminary assessment revealed that many of the cases involved the new onset of depressed mood, suicidal thoughts, and changes in emotion and behavior within just days to weeks of starting Chantix use. At that time the FDA recommended that doctors monitor their patients that were taking Chantix for behavior and mood changes.
That has now been stepped up several levels. In conducting their review the food and drug administration stated just on February 1, 2008 that "it appears increasingly likely that there is an association between Chantix and serious neuropsychiatric symptoms". Well the symptoms that the FDA's referring to include suicidal ideation or suicidal thoughts, attempted suicide, completed suicide, agitation and other changes in behavior.
The statement made by the FDA was made in conjunction with a public health advisory and a requested change to the label for Chantix in order to address this additional safety information. The public health advisory issued by the FDA advises that patients taking Chantix should immediately report changes in mood and behavior to their doctors. It's important to note that in most cases, the neuropsychiatric symptoms discussed by the FDA developed during Chantix treatment but there were other cases where it developed after stopping Chantix use.
Some of the other points from the FDA's public health advisory says "Chantix may cause worsening of a current psychiatric illness even if it is currently under control and may cause an old psychiatric illness to reoccur". The advisory from the FDA goes on to state that patients taking Chantix may experience vivid, unusual or strange dreams and that patients taking Chantix may experience an impairment of the ability to drive or operate heavy machinery.
The FDA's review is going to continue but these developments are very serious and while we should applaud people who want to stop smoking, because they should want stop smoking, pharmaceutical companies like Pfizer need to make sure that the drugs they push on TV are safe and are not going to close the kinds of neuropsychiatric problems that the FDA's health advisory discusses.
Makr & Associates have been contacted by hundreds of Chantix victims, including people who attempted suicide and the families of those who have tragically committed suicide. If you would like more information about these cases or about the firm please visit us at www.chantixsuicidelawsuit.com or www.youhaverights.com.
Posted under: Dangerous Drugs • Chantix