Scott,
Not sure this is a good comparison. There are some legitimate medical concerns which have appeared with obesity drug treatment. This never occurred with prozac(fluoxetine). Most of the prozac scare occurred secondary to the church of scientology campaign against it. It was supposed to make people suicidal, crazy, homicidal, and every other claim that could be produced. They went by different names in different states and supported the "prozac defense" in many cases. They never won, and the fda research never found any substance to these claims, but the media and marketing damage was done. You'll notice the media coverage decreased when the second ssri came out...zoloft(sertraline), but we all still have heard of prozac and make jokes about it, which only wreaks havoc and anxiety upon those who would benefit. However, how many of us know about luvox and paxil, the other ssri antidepressants, and why don't all of the 4 ssri meds cause the same terrible problems the first one out supposedly does? We all know the answer...the claims were simply garbage, something we don't yet know for redux, even if there are only problems in a few.
Also, there is a big difference in the physiologic/pharmacologic reasons for efficacy in the obesity drugs vs. the ssri antidepressants. They do not work the same way, nor are the anti-obesity drugs truly typical ssri meds by any stretch. Totally different side effect profiles, as well. For that matter, someone on the fen-phen regimen would have the efficacy of ssri antidepressants interfered with.
In other words, there are legitimate medical concerns for the public's fear of anti-obesity drugs which got so hot so quickly without enough research to substantiate safety in advance, all due to the desire in our country to lose weight...it does what we want, so it must be safe.....kind of like any product which is natural must be safe....another misleading media style. The prozac scare was based on nothing factual, just a group with an agenda.
That being said, IPIC likely will be fine in the future, but there is some reason for concern about their short-term movement.
Take care,
Marshall |
