OT: CDC Leads SSRI Disinformation Media Blitz

[Guest guest]

CDC Leads SSRI Disinformation Media Blitz

July 20, 2007.

Lawyers and Settlements - Vancouver,BC,Canada*

By Pringle digg

http://www.lawyersandsettlements.com/articles/01162/ssri-cdc.html

Washington, DC: In a June 27, 2007 press release that made headlines

all over the world the US Centers for Disease Control announced that

birth defects associated with the use of antidepressants by pregnant

women are rare. As proof for this claim, the CDC cited two new

studies published in the New England Journal of Medicine.

Over the following 2 weeks hundreds of stories magically appeared in

newspapers with headlines splashed all over the internet

and " medical experts " appeared live on all the major television

networks to tout the new studies as major health " news " in a well-

coordinated media blitz clearly aimed at promoting the sale of

selective serotonin reuptake inhibitor antidepressants (SSRIs) to

pregnant women.

The well-coordinated blitz downplayed all the serious birth defects

that have been reported in numerous studies over the past several

years and all the warnings issued by the FDA over the past several

years about the fetal harm known to be associated with the drugs.

The antidepressants included in the NEJM studies included Paxil by

GlaxoKline, Zoloft marketed by Pfizer; Prozac sold by Eli

Lilly; Celexa and Lexapro by Forest Laboratories, Effexor marketed

by Wyeth, Luvox by Solvay, and the generic makers of these drugs

include Barr Pharmaceuticals, Ranbaxy Labs and Genpharm.

The public needs to know that the CDC study was funded in part by

GlaxoKline, the maker of Paxil, which carries the strongest FDA

warnings about birth defects developing in infants exposed to the

drug in the womb.

Experts point out that the hundreds of headlines failed to disclose

the best kept secret about SSRIs - that the drugs do not work. " When

tested in head-to-head competition it would take more space than a

newspaper article will permit to explain how hard the researchers

have to " work " to " prove " that these antidepressants work at all, "

says SSRI expert, Dr Grace , author of " Rethinking

Psychiatric Drugs: A Guide for Informed Consent. "

A fact also not mentioned in the headlines is that the studies were

limited to women who took the drugs during the first trimester of

pregnancy and the research consisted of mostly phone conversations

that took place years ago with women who relied on their own

memories without reviewing any medical records or actual pharmacy

prescription data.

Most importantly, experts say, the researchers diluted the FDA

warning about studies that found babies exposed to SSRIs after the

20th week of pregnancy, have a 6-fold increased risk of developing

persistent pulmonary hypertension, a life-threatening lung disorder.

On July 19, 2006, the agency issued a Public Health Advisory and

said, " the FDA has asked the sponsors of all SSRIs to change

prescribing information to describe the potential risk for PPHN. "

The Advisory warned that: " Babies born with PPHN have abnormal blood

flow through the heart and lungs and do not get enough oxygen to

their bodies " and " Babies with PPHN can be very sick and may die. "

On October 16, 2006, the first PPHN related lawsuit was filed

against Glaxo on behalf of the family of an infant born with the

disorder after exposure to Paxil in the womb, by Attorney

Barth Menzies, a partner in the Baum Hedlund law firm and the leader

of the firm's Antidepressant Litigation Department.

According to Ms Menzies, " FDA regulations require Glaxo to issue

stronger warnings whenever there is reasonable evidence of an

association between a serious risk and Paxil. "

She points out that research indicated the risk of PPHN in a study

published more than 10 years ago on October 3, 1996, in the New

England Journal of Medicine, lead by Dr Chambers of the

Department of Pediatrics at the University of California-San Diego.

" FDA regulations specifically state that a causal link need not be

proven and allow Glaxo to issue a new warning without prior FDA

approval, " Ms Menzies notes.

She reports that infants born with PPHN often require mechanical

assistance to breath but 10% to 20% of infants do not survive even

when they receive treatment.

The PPHN babies that do survive often experience developmental

delays, brain abnormalities and hearing loss, experts say.

The headlines about the NEJM studies in the media were also

misleading because the researchers did find that Zoloft and Paxil

were associated with " significant increases " in specific birth

defects, and stated the " current study suggests that specific SSRIs

may increase the risk of specific birth defects, and further studies

will need sufficient power to pursue these important clinical

questions. "

Heart birth defects in infants exposed to Paxil were found to occur

3 times more often and heart defects were 2 times higher in newborns

exposed to Zoloft. The CDC researchers reported that by using

an " embryologically based classification " of heart defects, " we

found a doubling of the risk of septal defects " associated with

Zoloft use, and " a tripling of the risk of right ventricular outflow

tract obstruction defects " associated with Paxil.

The studies also found a nearly 6-fold rise in the risk of clubfoot

in children of women who used Paxil and reported other birth defects

including (1) anencephaly, (2) craniosynostosis; and (3)

omphalocele.

Anencephaly, a neural tube defect where much of the brain does not

develop, was found to be 2.4 times higher, and omphalocele, a

condition in which the infant's intestine or other abdominal organs

protrude from the navel was 2.8 times more prevalent overall and 6.4

times higher with Paxil.

Craniosynostosis, an abnormality in which connections of the skull

bones close prematurely, was found to be 2.5 times greater, and the

neural tube defect, spina bifida, a condition where the spinal

column does not completely close in the first month of pregnancy,

was also noted.

Experts warn that far more infants will be born with birth defects

in the coming years as a result of tens of thousands of infants

being exposed to SSRIs in the womb every year.

In addition to birth defects, many other serious adverse events have

been found to be associated with SSRIs over the past decade. Studies

have shown the drugs to be linked to suicidality, violent and

homicidal behavior, abnormal gastrointestinal and uterine bleeding,

fertility problems, sexual dysfunction, a decrease in bone density,

and a severe withdrawal syndrome in patients and infants born to

mothers taking the drugs.

The risk associated with depression in pregnancy is suicidality. But

one of the world's leading authorities on SSRIs, Dr Breggin,

reports that SSRIs are known to increase the risks of suicide. " In

fact, " he says, " the new FDA labels for antidepressants specifically

warn about SSRI-induced suicidality in youth and in young adults,

the very group most likely to become pregnant. "

" The SSRIs not only threaten to cause the death of the mother

through suicide but the death of the child through lethal birth

defects as well, " Dr Breggin advises.

As a direct result of the industry's control over the mainstream

media, the public is never properly warned about serious risks found

to be associated with a drug because if the story gets told at all,

it will only be in the news for a day or two, and then " medical

experts " will suddenly show up on " news " programs for 2 or 3 days in

a row to present what amounts to an infomercial to discount the

risks reported in the study.

The industry's control of the media began back in the late 1990s

when the ban on direct-to-consumer advertising was lifted. Since

then, the industry has invested so much money in advertising that

all the media companies in the US are now dependent on drug money.

Due to this control, the industry paid shills are now dispatched on

a regular basis to disseminate false information about the risks and

benefits of a drug using the public airwaves even when an

advertisement that contained the same bogus information would result

in the sanction of a drug company for presenting false and

misleading information to the public.

Drug companies basically bribe the medial journals to print their

studies because the editors know the company will purchase thousands

of copies for distribution to prescribing doctors, with full

knowledge that most doctors will never read the whole study, but

will remember the misleading headline because it was published in

the " reputable " medical journal.

And Big Pharma funnels money to researchers in a variety of ways. Dr

Marcia Angell, a nationally recognized authority on medical ethics

and a former editor of the New England Journal of Medicine, had this

to say in a the NEJM in 2000, about the financial ties between the

industry and researchers:

" The ties between clinical researchers and industry include not only

grant supports, but also a host of other financial arrangements.

" Researchers also serve as consultants to companies whose products

they are studying, join advisory boards and speakers bureaus, enter

into patent and royalty arrangements, agree to be the listed authors

of articles ghostwritten by interested companies, promote drugs and

devices at company sponsored symposiums, and allow themselves to be

plied with expensive gifts and trips to luxurious settings "

After a rigged study is planted in a medical journal, the next step

in the marketing scam is to provide a favorable report on the

findings, also ghost-written by the drug maker or a PR firm, in a

press release that is sent out to all the major news outlets which

guarantees that headlines about the results will appear all over the

world.

From there, the company uses the media to plant feature stories to

reinforce the headline of the press release and in many cases, the

news articles will quote the information verbatim from the drug

maker's press release.

In the final act, the media provides the company with a platform for

the " medical experts " to reach consumers to tout the new study on

all the major networks in " news " segments which in turn sends

patients running to their doctors with news of the miraculous new

findings and demanding a prescription for the drug.

In the book, " Trust Us We're Experts, " by Sheldon Rampton and

Stauber, the authors document the many techniques used by PR firms

hired to pump out propaganda through the press and refer to the

mainstream media as the " disinfotainment industry. "

They report that the psychiatric manipulation industry is enormous

and pays out about $10 billion a year to propaganda experts and that

about 40% of all stories in the media are planted by PR firms.

Because most news stories on radio and TV are nothing more than a

rehashing of stories published in newspapers, the book notes, the

news Americans receive every day amounts to nothing but propaganda.

The success of the media backed campaign to sell SSRIs to pregnant

women by discounting the years of studies showing serious harm to

the fetus is clear evidence that " disinfotainment industry " is still

paying high dividends to all shareholders in the US.

SSRI Birth Defects Legal Help

If you took any SSRI antidepressant medication during pregnancy and

your baby suffered any type of birth defect, please contact a lawyer

involved in a possible [sSRI Birth Defects Lawsuit] who will review

your case at no cost or obligation.