Drug Maker Illegally Markets Antidepressant to Kids
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Drug maker Forest Laboratories was accused by the Justice Department on Wednesday of illegally marketing the popular antidepressant Celexa to children and teens. The government alleges that the company hid the results of a clinical trial which found that Celexa was ineffective and possibly dangerous for use by children. In addition, the government also accused Forest Laboratories of paying kickbacks to doctors who prescribed Celexa or other drugs.
Forest heavily promoted results from a differing clinical trial, which showed that the drug was effective, while not disclosing the negative study to researchers or its own staff and sales representatives. They also were aware of the negative study for at least 3 years before finally acknowledging it, reports the New York Times.
In a disturbing twist, Forest is accused of not only marketing the dangerous drug, but of actually illegally convincing doctors to prescribe it. The government maintains that doctors were given baseball tickets, gift certificates, and paid vacations in exchange for prescriptions. The complaint also charges that the company separately ran so-called “seeding studies”, or trials, which were actually just marketing efforts to promote Celexa to doctors.
Celexa and Lexapro are two versions of the same drug, citalopram. The drugs are currently approved by the Food and Drug Administration only for adults. Antidepressants approved for adults continue to be widely used by doctors to treat children. But those drugs, including Celexa and Lexapro, all now carry a prominent “black box” warning that the drugs could cause suicidal thinking or behavior in some children.
The underlying problem in all this is the behavior of the doctors. Many doctors continue to prescribe dangerous antidepressants to children when there are no studies or other proof that the drugs are safe or even effective. Combine that with crooked doctors who are willing to sell out their own patients for tickets to a baseball game, and it is a bleak environment indeed for children seeking psychological help.