Offered as an FYI because these drugs are handed out as freely as aspirin.
A Prescription for Pain
Dear Reader,
Could treating a simple infection leave you in chronic pain for the rest of your life?
It sounds hard to believe, but it's happening everywhere.
It's happening to people like David Melvin, who used to bike 10 miles a day and bench press 300 pounds. That was before the agonizing nerve pain and constant fatigue.
Or a 28-year old teacher who was left with muscle spasms, weakness and shortness of breath.
They're just two of the victims of a popular class of antibiotics known as fluoroquinolones (FQs), including Levaquin and Cipro.
Who could know that taking a simple, 10-day course of antibiotics could leave you battling crippling pain forever?
Our government knew. And according to a secret document, they may have been hiding the risks from millions of Americans for at least two years.
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A prescription for pain
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"Why haven't you guys done something with your own data?"
That's what Melvin -- and plenty of other victims of FQs -- are asking the FDA after a memo we were never supposed to see came to light.
Thanks to a Freedom of Information Act request, we know that in 2013 the agency's Center for Drug Evaluation and Research launched a review of FQs and peripheral neuropathy.
That's the pain, numbness and weakness typically felt in your hands and feet from nerve damage.
And what the FDA found should have set off warning alarms all across the medical community. For example, government researchers discovered that:
Anyone who takes an FQ drug is at risk for this debilitating condition. The patients the FDA studied were young, healthy and had no history of peripheral neuropathy.
Some patients started getting symptoms right from the very first pill.
At the very first sign of nerve damage it's strongly recommended that these drugs should be discontinued immediately.
And...that label warnings should be updated to say if you do come down with peripheral neuropathy from an FQ med, you may have it forever.
Even worse, the researchers found that the way FQ drugs damage cells -- something called mitochondrial toxicity -- is the same way diseases such as Parkinson's, Alzheimer's and ALS can develop.
But for two years, the FDA hasn't done a darned thing to alert us. They've been sitting on their hands so long their fingers are turning blue -- even though millions of us are being prescribed these meds for everything from sniffles to earaches!
And to Melvin, that's practically criminal.
"They are legally obligated to protect the public," he said.
Well, I know that and you know that -- but the FDA seems to have forgotten it a long time ago.
Now the FDA is trying to shut up FQ victims once and for all by holding a hearing on FQ drugs November 5th.
But trust me -- this thing is already looking more rigged than a Third World election.
The agenda is already out, and the FDA is limiting the discussion to the use of FQs on people with COPD and simple urinary tract infections.
In other words, don't expect to hear a word about the scores of victims who were perfectly healthy one day and had their lives wrecked by FQs the next.
If you or someone you love is taking an FQ antibiotic like Cipro, Levaquin, Avelox, Noroxin, Floxin and Factive, make an appointment with your doctor right away.
There's a good chance he's never heard about the dangers of these meds and what they can do to your body.
And that's exactly the way our government wanted it.
To Your Good Health,
Jenny Thompson
Sources:
"FDA to hold hearing on benefits of 3 common antibiotics" WRIC Newsroom, October 2, 2015, wric.com
"Joint Meeting of the Antimicrobial Drugs Advisory Committee (Formerly Known as the Anti-Infective Drugs Advisory Committee) and the Drug Safety and Risk Management Advisory Committee; Notice of Meeting" October 1, 2015, federalregister.gov
