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Edited on Thu Jan-13-05 11:15 AM by G_j
Public Citizen Press Releases
Providing the latest information about Public Citizen activities
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Jan. 12, 2005
Public Citizen Launches www.WorstPills.org a Comprehensive Online Database
That Lists Dangerous Prescription Drugs and Provides Alternatives
Revamped Site Coincides With Release of New "Worst Pills, Best Pills"
Book; Both Warn Consumers About Dangerous Drugs and Safer Alternatives
WASHINGTON, D.C. - Public Citizen has launched a new Web site,
www.WorstPills.org, that provides consumers with comprehensive
information about 538 prescription drugs and warns them of 181 drugs
that are unsafe or ineffective.
The searchable, online database also provides information about drug
pricing, outlines 10 rules for safer drug use, has monthly issues of
Public Citizen's Worst Pills, Best Pills newsletter and enables users to
sign up for e-alerts about newly discovered drug dangers. People looking
for information on the site can search by drug, medical condition or by
drug-induced disease. The Web site contains the entire contents of the
just-published edition of the book, "Worst Pills, Best Pills," including
a new chapter on dietary supplements.
The site is particularly valuable to consumers because Public Citizen
has a strong track record of identifying dangerous drugs well before
federal regulators take action to ban or put warnings on these drugs.
For example, in April 2001, Public Citizen warned consumers against
taking Vioxx because it increases the risk of heart attack. But it
wasn't until this fall that Merck pulled the drug from shelves, citing
its increased heart attack risk.
Vioxx was the ninth prescription drug to be taken off the market in the
past seven years that Public Citizen had previously warned consumers not
to use. For four of the drugs - Vioxx, Baycol, Rezulin and Serzone -
Public Citizen issued warnings more than two years before their removal
from the market. Similarly, Public Citizen warned patients not to use
Celebrex three and a half years before the government announced that a
study showed it increased heart risks.
"As recent events have shown, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration,
which receives well over $100 million a year in funding from the drug
industry largely to review drugs more rapidly, doesn't do a good job of
protecting people from medications that can seriously harm or kill
them," said Dr. Sidney Wolfe, director of Public Citizen's Health
Research Group. "We provide consumers with indispensable and potentially
life-saving information that they can't get anywhere else - certainly
not from the federal government or drug industry."
WorstPills.org has existed since January 2003 in a less comprehensive
form; the revamped site has been redesigned and updated with all the
data in Public Citizen's newly released edition of "Worst Pills, Best
Pills," a book that has sold more than 2.2 million copies since first
being issued in 1988. The updated book, just published by Simon &
Schuster, is available in bookstores this week.
Public Citizen obtains information by gathering and analyzing all
available records about prescription drugs - sometimes even suing the
federal government to obtain them. While others have created sites about
prescription drugs, Public Citizen's is exceptionally comprehensive, and
Public Citizen is the only group to warn consumers against using certain
drugs. Public Citizen does not take government or corporate, money, so
it is a completely independent, unbiased source of information.
"The major drug manufacturers have bombarded consumers with misleading
TV and print advertising about prescription drugs, so consumers have a
compelling need for unbiased information about safety and
effectiveness," said Public Citizen President Joan Claybrook. "This
effort is part of Public Citizen's decadeslong commitment to protecting
consumers from products that can harm them."
Prescription drug safety is becoming more relevant as people take more
medications. An estimated 100,000 people in the United States die
annually from adverse drug reactions, and nearly 1.5 million people are
injured so seriously by adverse drug reactions that they require
hospitalization.
Because regulators and drug companies are slow to recognize and react
to drug dangers, Public Citizen created a "do not use" list of drug
consumers shouldn't take. Big-selling drugs still on the market, but
listed as "do not use" on WorstPills.org include: Crestor (for high
cholesterol), Darvon, Bextra and Ultracet (pain relievers); the oral
contraceptives Yasmin, Desogen and Orthocept; and Meridia (for weight
loss).
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