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Letters to the Editor
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Safety of medicines
All “medicinal” products should be subject to same standards
From Dr J. D. Flack, MRPharmS
Two recent issues of The Pharmaceutical Journal have raised important
issues regarding the safety of medicines and of other general sale products
that claim to have medicinal properties, such as soy and chocolate products
(29 October, p547, p554,
and 5 November, p576). I wholeheartedly agree with the authors of these
articles that we should be careful as a profession
in making medicinal claims for any products without the full weight of
scientific facts (or the absence of them).
It is time the profession as a whole — that is, all those in discovering,
developing, marketing, distributing and dispensing medicines or products
claiming medicinal benefits — “got back to basics”, ie,
paid more attention to the pharmacological actions of the products they
are promoting or selling to doctors, pharmacists or the general public.
The basic pharmacology of COX-2 inhibitors as described by Andy
Hutchinson (PJ, 29 October, p547) was known over a decade ago but the potential for
cardiovascular side effects has largely been eclipsed by the marketing
mantra that they were free of the COX-1 gastric irritancy problems. Those
companies involved are indeed reaping the whirlwind of the seeds they have
themselves sowed. And this was a class of drugs that that had the full
gamut of long-term preclinical and clinical testing, as well as detailed
and independent regulatory review by the major government medicine agencies
around the world, before entering the market place.
So I agree with Mike
Stockham (PJ, 5 November, p576) and “Onlooker” (PJ,
29 October, p554) in their views on soy and chocolate products. These products
may or may not contain substances at varying levels that may interact with
physiological systems and, in certain pathological situations, provide
some therapeutic benefit. It is essential that we also know their potential
for long-term clinical safety and that they pass the rigour of appropriate
regulatory efficacy and safety standards. Perhaps we should be reminded
of the words of the father of therapeutics, Paracelsus — “All
substances are poisons; there is none which is not a poison. The right
dose differentiates a poison and a remedy.” We ignore his words at
our own and our children’s peril.
John Flack
Melbourne,
Australia |
The
Pharmaceutical Journal