Suicide, violence linked with Prozac

from Xinhuanet

01 January 2005

BEIJING, Jan. 1 (Xinhuanet) – Documents from The British Medical Journal (BMJ) revealed that antidepressant drug Prozac, made by Eli Lilly & Company, might have connection with suicide attempt and violence.

The British Medical Journal (BMJ) says it has received confidential documents that appear to link Prozac, the anti-depressant prescribed to millions of people, with violence and suicide.These documents, which had been sent by The British Medical Journal this Friday to the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA), show that Prozac, whose generic name is fluoxetine, can have serious side effects such as tendency to commit suicide or to behave in a violent manner.

The journal says the internal company documents were sent to it anonymously last month and have now been sent to the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA), the top American agency for vetting drug safety. The FDA has decided to review the documents, it says.

The papers are missing items from a controversial lawsuit that embroiled Prozac's maker, Eli Lilly, and the victims of a workplace shooting in Kentucky in 1989, in which eight people were shot dead and 12 were injured, the BMJ says. "The documents appear to suggest a link between Prozac...and suicide attempts and violence," the BMJ article says.

The assailant, Joseph Wesbecker, who killed himself during the shooting, had had a history of depression and had been placed on Prozac a month before he went on the rampage. The plaintiffs alleged that Prozac had driven Wesbecker to commit the murders and that Eli Lilly knew the drug could have harmful side-effects.

Lilly had however won a 9 to 3 jury verdict in that case and subsequently claimed that it was "proven in a court of law that Prozac is safe and effective."

The documents now submitted to FDA have internal reviews and memos written during a clinical study on the effects of the drug. They show Eli Lilly officials were aware in the 1980's that the drug had troubling side effects.

Mr. Hinchey (Democrat, New York) said that "This case demonstrates the need for Congress to mandate the complete disclosure of all clinical studies for FDA-approved drugs so that patients and their doctors, not the drug companies, decide whether the benefits of taking a certain medicine outweigh the risks."

(Agencies) Related Story Copyright ©2003 Xinhua News Agency. All rights reserved.