What kinds of pills are people taking these days?

Some of the pharmaceuticals on the market today were once rejected because they made people too sick.

Why is it okay to give people poison - for any reason? Are people thought to be terminally ill somehow less important than people who are healthy? AZT, a cancer drug once shelved because the side effects were devastating, has found its way back into the drugstores. The justification is that the "virus" needs to be "hit hard." However, the immune system also gets destroyed in the process. Drugs that cause life-threatening birth defects have traditionally not been given to pregnant women, but women diagnosed with AIDS or as HIV positive will be pressured by doctors to take AZT - Azidothymidine - or a "combination therapy" drug that contains AZT. Whatever happened to "first do no harm?"

Thalidomide - a drug banned because it caused thousands of children to be born without hands or arms, with severe internal organ defects, or learning disabilities - has been brought back. The justification for this re-classification is that it would not be given to pregnant women. It caused extreme harm to fetuses in only a few weeks - what does it do to adults on a long term basis? There's no good reason for anyone to take Thalidomide.

Some of the drugs given to "people with AIDS" are causing fatal rashes, strokes, immune system failure, some people seem to be literally starving to death as their metabolism causes fat deposits and other problems.

One drug, specifically for "HIV infection," Sustiva, is not only extremely toxic, but causes nightmares, depression, and in some cases, suicide. In fact, in this country, people diagnosed as having AIDS or as being "HIV positive" are given more anti-depressant/anti-anxiety drug prescriptions than drugs that are AIDS/HIV-specific. People often take both classifications of drugs - because they believe that they are dying or because they are trying to cope with the shame, guilt, fear or feelings of isolation a positive diagnosis can bring, especially in the repressive society we live in today. When all these drugs are used together, a toxic effect surely will occur very quickly.

Drug interactions are not taken as seriously in people who are thought to be "dying." Why is that? What if the person is NOT dying but only very sick? Shouldn't they get the best that is available to them, like a safe clean warm place to sleep, nutritious fresh food and emotional - perhaps even spiritual support?

Articles about pharmaceuticals that cause adverse side effects or death

Sustiva changed from Category C (Risk of Fetal Harm Cannot Be Ruled Out) to Category D (Positive Evidence of Fetal Risk). Mar. 31, 2005

Are AIDS drugs worse than the disease? Don't ask the people who make them - by Celia Farber, New York Press - Dec. 28, 2004

AIDS Researcher Chief Altered Safety Report (nevirapine trials) - Dec. 15, 2004

A new warning about Nevirapine from the FDA, February 2004

"Exclusive: The Truth about Nevirapine" - an article by Liam Scheff from Dec. 20, 2004.

"The Trouble With Nevirapine" - by Anthony Brink. April, 2002

Scientific Data Against the Use of Nevirapine (in Pregnant Women, Infants, Children, and Anybody Else) - from 2001

Abbott Laboratory's FDA problems - two drugs under fire: FDA made public a letter ordering Abbott Laboratories to stop circulating two advertisements for its antiretroviral drug Kaletra immediately because the agency said the ads "exaggerate" the drug's benefits and omit information about possible "life-threatening safety risks,"
According to a letter to Abbott Labs - Norvir ad "fails to disclose that adverse events may occur when Norvir is taken concomitantly with sildenafil and the possibility exists of cross resistance among protease inhibitors and of lipid disorders," "promotional materials directed to consumers should prominently convey that the drug does not cure HIV infection," and "The cost chart misleadingly claims that Norvir has the lowest daily cost of all antiretroviral drugs." More news soon.

Here's a story from the New England Journal of Medicine regarding cells and HIV medications. -from April 2002

GlaxoSmithKline Alert: Ziagen labeled as Combivir

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   ...the following is blatantly stolen from the VirusMyth website:

PROBLEMS WITH NEVIRAPINE TRIALS (MARCH '02)

NEUROPSYCHIATRIC COMPLICATIONS OF NEVIRAPINE TREATMENT From April 2002: BMJ

The pharmaceutical company Boehringer Ingelheim dropped plans to try to get FDA permission to market nevirapine for preventing mother-to-child transmission of HIV in the US after "irregularities" were found in African trials of the drug. The FDA believes that the problems are "potentially quite serious". See this Reuters report, this AP release, this article from South Africa's Business Day, and this article from the Washington Post.

Some researchers rushed to defend the drug fearing it would give South Africa's government an excuse to reject it. See this Reuters report. "Top" South African scientists urged their government to end its opposition to the use of the drug. See this article from Reuters. South Africa's Medicines Control Council is considering reviewing the registration of the drug, says this article from South Africa's Business Day.

The Perth Group made a presentation reviewing the African nevirapine trials. View the slides, and listen (Real audio, 65 minutes) to the presentation, or read the transcript. See also thisarticle by Anthony Brink.

Bad medicine gets even worse: 16,000 patients to be injected with two AIDS drugs that don't work

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Drugs Used in the Treatment of HIV Infection - FDA

a cartoon about pills

Tests given for HIV and hepatitis - from the FDA. Gives approval dates and company information

 

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