Propecia: Court let Merck hide secrets about a popular drug's risks

[Eugene]

Source: Reuters

Court let Merck hide secrets about a popular drug’s risks

Lawsuits claim baldness drug Propecia causes sexual problems and depression. The judge sealed evidence – uncovered by Reuters – suggesting the maker downplayed the side effects. A widow wants the truth out.

By DAN LEVINE Filed Sept. 11, 2019, 1 p.m. GMT

-snip-

It had started with dark, sulking moods. Then he lost interest in sex. His wife asked him if he was having an affair. “No … Something’s just not right down there,” Kelly said her husband told her. Panic attacks set in.

He suspected the cause might have been Propecia, the popular Merck & Co drug he had been taking to treat hair loss since around the time his problems started. He quit the pills, but still he couldn’t sleep, and he flashed random anger at the children. He started talking about killing himself.

On the morning of March 5, 2013, about 45 minutes before his wife got home, John Pfaff stepped onto the railroad tracks a block away and into the path of a southbound Amtrak train. He was killed on impact.

Kelly Pfaff blames Merck for her husband’s death at age 40. In a lawsuit filed in 2015, she alleges that the pharmaceuticals company for years knew but concealed from the public that Propecia could cause the persistent sexual dysfunction and depression that led to her husband’s suicide about a year after he quit taking the drug.

John Pfaff wasn’t the only man who experienced sexual problems after taking Propecia. His widow’s lawsuit was one of more than 1,100 filed across the United States and consolidated in so-called multidistrict litigation (MDL) in federal court in Brooklyn, New York. They accuse Merck of not adequately warning patients of the drug’s possible side effects and their duration.

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Read more: https://www.reuters.com/investigates/special-report/usa-courts-secrecy-propecia/

[Desert Dem]

1. My husband had MS with bladder spasms

Despite this disease, we had a healthy sex life. Then the Propecia or finasteride, it’s generic name, was prescribed by his neurologist, after about 6 months of daily dose, no help with spasms, but a complete disappearance of his libido. And what was so tragic, he couldn’t understand why his libido was gone, and of course, the impotence that accompanies this, tore him up emotionally but I was never aware how badly until I read his journal, he died of Stage IV cancer last year, and it was page after page of years of emotional agony of his loss of all sexuality. It’s a horrible drug. I had no idea the company was withholding this side effect info. I’m devastated again but thank you for posting this news. At least I know it wasn’t me.

[Mike 03]

3. I'm so sorry about your husband.

My heart goes out to both him and you.

Years ago when I thought I was losing hair too quickly I began visiting a website for men who were balding prematurely and there were so many discussions on this topic, with men wondering whether Propecia could be the cause of their lost libido, and others trying to tell them, "No, it couldn't be or otherwise everyone would know about this." Now this comes out. That is one reason I never considered taking it and, luckily, I was not losing my hair, just shedding a lot during a period of stress. But so many men who took this drug way back when it was new KNEW it had this effect but wanted to keep taking it because it might help them. My doctor told me in his opinion the drug did little, but I don't know if it worked for men or not.

[Desert Dem]

5. Bosley Hair Transplant Centers

prescribed it after grafting too. At least In Dallas in the mid-2000’s.

[Tanuki]

2. Donald Trump takes this drug.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/to-your-health/wp/2017/02/03/side-effects-of-the-drug-trump-reportedly-takes-for-hair-loss/

"President Trump’s personal physician recently revealed that the president takes finasteride, a drug used to combat male-pattern baldness. The medication has been in the news for another reason: its potential side effects."....(more)

[trotsky]

4. "..couldn't sleep, and he flashed random anger..."

Gee, doesn't sound like Donald at all!

[progree]

6. Five times worse?: Proscar (5 mg finasteride) for BPH (enlarged prostate)

So if Propecia (1 mg finasteride for baldness) is bad, then Proscar (5 mg finasteride for BPH) has gotta be a lot worse.