Review of Side Effects by Alison Bass - Book Report/Review Example

?Review of Side Effects by Alison Bass Between the years 1994 and 2002, the use of antidepressants among children as well as adolescents was very common, and these were being prescribed to the “below 18 age group” much more than an acne product. Various statistical data suggest that more than 11 million prescriptions for antidepressants were made in 2002 itself for children and adolescents in the US. Evidence also shows that about 2.7 million prescriptions were for children under 12. Unfortunately, this trend of using antidepressants among such a young age group only increased the following year. During this period, Paxil became the best-selling antidepressant in the world, its prescriptions estimated at 1.2 million. This helped its manufacturer, GlaxoSmithKline, to generate revenues amounting to $55 million. Alison Bass is one of the noteworthy journalists known for her investigative works as well as her findings. Side Effects is a widely read book written by Bass which presents before the readers, how Glaxo Smith Kline dealt with the controversy relating to anti depressants such as Paxil, Prozac and Zoloft. With her impressive research and argumentative skills, Bass tries to normalize the controversy. The book narrates the story of a famous court case surrounding the best selling drug of Glaxo Smithkline. “ It tell us the lives of two women; a prosecutor and a whistleblower - who exposed the pattern of deception in the research and marketing of Paxil, an antidepressant prescribed to millions of children and adults” (Bass, 2008, p.1). In the book, one can see for the first time, an administrator courageously uncovering the researchers at the prestigious Ivy League university, wherein the author misrepresented data in a key study of Paxil. Through her subtle writing skills, she has presented before the readers the suicide risks in adolescents taking the drug. The book features real life stories of dedicated professionals, who stand for ethical right regardless of various obstacles in their personal lives. Through Side Effects, the readers come across the ‘anything goes’ attitude of the pharmaceutical industries. Glaxo’s drugs including Prozac, Paxil and Zoloft became one of the most widely used drugs in the pharmaceutical industry. Though the same duplicity was repeated later, it could not succeed as a result of the lawsuit brought by New York State attorney, and thus, deceiving consumers regarding the safety and effectiveness of some new drugs became really difficult. Reflecting on the international reviews of Side Effects, Nature Medicine reviews that the book talks about “ how good intentions to effectively treat depressed patients can be subverted by an increasingly market-driven pharmaceutical industry” (Bass, 2008, p.1) . The New England Journal of Medicine reviews that the book is way beyond a bestselling antidepressant where the author has used the “case of Paxil to expose the unsavory and self-serving relationships among members of the pharmaceutical industry, psychiatrists etc” (Bass, 2008, p.1). Furthermore, Dr. Jerome Kassirer reflects that the book is “a serious indictment of the pharmaceutical industry, clinical researchers, and government regulators, told in captivating prose. It makes you worry about the authenticity of the evidence that doctors use from day to day." (Bass, 2008, p.1) . During the early 1990s, pharmaceutical industry spent about $8.9 million as user-fee money and it was just 7 percent of the FDA’s drug-review budget. In 2004, user fees reached $232 million, which comprised about 53 percent of the agency’s entire drug-review budget. The user fees then started increasing again. Review on the spending pattern of FDA showed that a major portion is being spent on new drug reviews instead of other activities such as monitoring of the approved drugs. It is revealed that “between 1998 and 2006, the drug companies spent a total of $1.2 billion on lobbying and political contributions in the U.S, according to the Center for Responsive Politics, a nonprofit nonpartisan research group that tracks money in politics” (Bass, 2008, p.2). The same study also discusses the financial ties between the drug industry and medical researchers. “Nine out of ten respondents in a survey of leading medical experts admitted they had some type of financial relationship with a drug company. Six out of ten acknowledged they had financial ties to companies whose drugs were recommended in the guidelines they crafted, according to a University of Toronto study. Doctors with such financial conflicts of interest are more likely to prescribe newer and more expensive drugs than doctors who don’t have such conflicts, according to recent studies” (Bass, 2008, p.2). It is common that the pharmaceutical industries offer practicing psychiatrists with various gifts. In Side Effects Alison Bass discusses the story of a heading drug, its manufacturer, and a favored psychiatrist who aims at profit rather than providing a good treatment for the patients. “Side Effects unfolds the sad tale of an established and lucrative antidepressant which was promoted for use by adolescents based on the questionable support of scientific experts who were themselves the beneficiaries of the drug company’s largesse. It opens with the case vignette of a teenager who asks her primary care physician about a particular antidepressant after watching its direct-to-consumer advertisement on television. Later, her symptoms of anxiety and depression paradoxically intensify after being prescribed this medication, and she eventually mutilates herself in self-destructive despair” (Eth, 2009, p.499). Side Effects portrays, in a wonderful manner, the way in which the pharmacological research has mis-evolved in greed. The book discusses how Bass' heroine, “Rose Firestein faces personal challenges in changing job after job fighting for the underdog, she joined former New York Governor Elliot Spitzer, then District Attorney for the State of New York, in a dogged quest to stop GlaxoSmithKline from profiting from unsafe prescriptions of Paxil for children and teens. Firestein developed a legal stance that enabled New York to bring state charges that did not conflict with the jurisdiction of the federal Food and Drug Administration (FDA). It also focuses on a flourishing sue brought against GlaxoSmithKlein by New York State for selective withholding of clinical trial information from physicians and how it influence doctors' decisions regarding prescribing SSRI drugs for children and adolescents in GSK's favor” (Krueger, 2008, p.1) In terms of scientific facts, Side Effects discusses the efficiency of Paxil, Zoloft, Effexor, Luvox and Remeron and their untested use on children and adolescents as well as the changes that followed the New York State lawsuit. One can also see the efforts of Bass to make readers question the power of greed. However, it is indicated in the book that the doctors in America will prescribe new drugs without actually testing its efficiency and this statement is completely true. References Bass, A. 2008. Side Effects: A Prosecutor, a Whistleblower, and A Bestselling Antidepressant on Trial. North Carolina: Algonquin Books, p.1. Retrieved October 14, 2013, from Read More