Mike Adams, the Health Ranger
See article keywords and concepts |  Garret Fitzgerald, called bextra, "A time bomb waiting to go off," and noted that the apparent dangers of bextra exceed those associated with Vioxx. Pfizer, of course, downplayed the study in an attempt to minimize any negative backlash from its release. The question remains, however: will Pfizer now follow in Merck's footsteps and voluntarily recall bextra? And if it refuses to do so, will the FDA step in and finally perform the regulatory function it has been so reluctant to use by banning bextra from the market? | | In the preliminary results, bextra was found to increase the incidence of heart attacks and strokes by 219%. The cardiologist who presented the study, Dr. Garret Fitzgerald, called bextra, "A time bomb waiting to go off," and noted that the apparent dangers of bextra exceed those associated with Vioxx. Pfizer, of course, downplayed the study in an attempt to minimize any negative backlash from its release. The question remains, however: will Pfizer now follow in Merck's footsteps and voluntarily recall bextra? |
Andreas Moritz
See book keywords and concepts |  Bextra is next. According to a study of more than 1,500 patients who had previously undergone cardiac surgery, those who were treated for pain with bextra were more likely to have heart and blood-clotting problems than those who received no drug at all. Stroke, heart attack, blood clots in the lung, deep vein blood clots in the leg, all can result just from taking this drug. Arthritis drugs have never been properly tested for safety. Vioxx, Celebrex, bextra, Aleve, and aspirin are just plain poisons. Another arthritis drug, infliximab (Remicade), is on alert for causing cancer. |
Mike Adams, the Health Ranger
See article keywords and concepts | | REPPED: Following the recent revelations that Vioxx cause a high incidence of heart attacks and strokes, a competing drug from Pfizer, bextra, has now been shown to display similar health problems. What's especially weighty about this particular revelation is that it comes from the American Heart Association, a disease-industry group that has traditionally acted in favor of pharmaceutical companies. Because of this, the AHA deserves credit for allowing this study to be published. In the preliminary results, bextra was found to increase the incidence of heart attacks and strokes by 219%. | | The question remains, however: will Pfizer now follow in Merck's footsteps and voluntarily recall bextra? And if it refuses to do so, will the FDA step in and finally perform the regulatory function it has been so reluctant to use by banning bextra from the market? Or will this warning be swept aside in favor of a policy that allows this drug to continue to be sold to tens of millions of Americans, regardless of its questionable safety? |
Andreas Moritz
See book keywords and concepts | | According to a study of more than 1,500 patients who had previously undergone cardiac surgery, those who were treated for pain with bextra were more likely to have heart and blood-clotting problems than those who received no drug at all. Stroke, heart attack, blood clots in the lung, deep vein blood clots in the leg, all can result just from taking this drug. Arthritis drugs have never been properly tested for safety. Vioxx, Celebrex, bextra, Aleve, and aspirin are just plain poisons. Another arthritis drug, infliximab (Remicade), is on alert for causing cancer. |
J. Douglas Bremner
See book keywords and concepts |  David Graham to cite bextra as one of the five most dangerous drugs on the market in November 2004. In January 2005 insurer Kaiser Perma-nente took bextra off its formulary, reasoning that the risks of the drug outweighed the benefits. Under a storm of controversy Pfizer finally pulled the drug from the market in April 2005.
Celebrex (or celecoxib, the generic name), marketed by Pfizer and Pharmacia, is a COX-2 inhibitor still on the market in the U.S. |
Melody Petersen
See book keywords and concepts |  Pharmacia, the drugs manufacturer, had asked the FDA in 2001 to approve bextra to treat both the chronic pain of arthritis and the more acute pain that follows surgery. The regulators agreed to approve the drug to treat arthritis but refused to allow the company to sell it for more intense pain. The regulators' decision upset Pharmacia's marketing plans. The company's executives had publicly boasted about Bextra's power, saying it relieved pain better than Celebrex, a similar pill Pharmacia was already selling with great success. | | The story of a pain reliever called bextra provides a case in point. Pharmacia, the drugs manufacturer, had asked the FDA in 2001 to approve bextra to treat both the chronic pain of arthritis and the more acute pain that follows surgery. The regulators agreed to approve the drug to treat arthritis but refused to allow the company to sell it for more intense pain. The regulators' decision upset Pharmacia's marketing plans. | | The regulators said in the confidential papers that Pharmacia's studies had shown that bextra relieved pain no better than cheap medicines like ibuprofen.
That was when Pharmacia turned to the advertising firm Omnicom and its research partner, Scirex. Pharmacia had paid the Scirex scientists to go to Austin, Texas, and the nearby city of San Marcos to recruit people who were to have two or more impacted molars removed during dental surgery. To ease their pain, Scirex gave the volunteers either bextra or Percocet, a short-acting narcotic. | | The company's executives had publicly boasted about Bextra's power, saying it relieved pain better than Celebrex, a similar pill Pharmacia was already selling with great success.
Yet most of the public did not learn that the FDA had refused the company's request to sell bextra for acute pain. As a standard practice, the government kept such information secret, calling it confidential commercial information. Included in those secret papers were details of why FDA reviewers denied the plan. |
Craig Pepin-Donat
See book keywords and concepts |  Over the years I was also prescribed multiple types of non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drugs including Vioxx, Celebrex and bextra, all of which have been proven to increase the risk of having a heart attack. During the time I took these three drugs, none of them helped. Ultimately, I made the decision to stop taking these medications. If you don't feel that you are getting results from a drug, why continue to take it? Yes, there are drugs that "take time" to get the benefit, and there are others that you cannot stop taking all at once without withdrawal symptoms or other health risks. |
Peter Rost
See book keywords and concepts |  If the ten drug company advisers had not cast their votes, the panel would have voted fourteen to eight that Vioxx should not return to the market and twelve to eight that bextra should be withdrawn.4 The ten advisers with company ties voted nine to one to keep bextra on the market and nine to one for Vioxx's return.
Eight of the ten panel members said in later interviews that their past relationships with the drug companies had "not influenced their votes."5 Nevertheless, says Dr. Sheldon Krimsky, a science policy expert at Tufts University, "such conflicts are common on F.D.A. |
Joe Graedon, M.S. and Teresa Graedon, Ph.D.
See book keywords and concepts |  First Vioxx and then bextra were pulled off the market. In the interim, it is estimated that more than 100,000 people who had been taking COX-2 inhibitors suffered heart attacks and strokes.75 According to FDA safety officer David Graham, MD, as many as 40,000 people may have died.76
The Broken Promise
If COX-2 inhibitors like Vioxx, bextra, and Celebrex had truly protected the digestive tract from damage, it might have been easier to justify their approval, aggressive marketing tactics, and high prices. |
Donald L. Barlett and James B. Steele
See book keywords and concepts |  That's what SCIREX did for Pharmacia and Pfizer's jointly marketed bextra, originally approved by the FDA in November 2001 for treating pain from arthritis and menstrual cramps. The FDA rejected a plea that
Bextra also be approved for acute pain. To encourage doctors to prescribe off-label for that purpose, the companies retained SCIREX. What happened next is spelled out in a lawsuit filed by the Congress of California Seniors: SCIREX recruited patients with impacted molars, gave them bextra, and then concluded that "the drug was effective in treating adults with acute pain. |
Bottom Line Health
See book keywords and concepts | | And thousands more may have died from taking the recently recalled Vioxx and bextra. Instead, try...
FOR OSTEOARTHRITIS
•Glucosamine sulfate. Take 1,500 milligrams (mg) of this supplement—made from chitin, which is derived from shellfish—along with 3 grams (g) a day of methylsulfonylmeth-ane (MSM), a natural substance in the human body. These nutrients repair cartilage, reducing arthritis pain within six weeks. For maximum tissue repair, take these supplements for two to five months. For chronic arthritis, you may continue for up to a year.
•Lidoderm. | | They list examples such as hormone replacement therapy (HRT), the now-banned Cox-2 inhibitors Vioxx and bextra, as well as Iressa, a lung cancer drug that physicians turned to based on early findings, only to find out later that it might do more harm than good.
"Our message is for physicians in the community to be aware of the potential risks of adopting therapies too early, and also for physicians presenting early results at meetings to be aware of how dramatically practice can change based on their presentations," says Giordano. |
Andreas Moritz
See book keywords and concepts | | Vioxx, Celebrex, bextra, Aleve, and aspirin are just plain poisons. Another arthritis drug, infliximab (Remicade), is on alert for causing cancer.
Amazingly, many people have been so blinded by clever advertising campaigns and brainwashing that they have no clue they are being methodically poisoned in order to support and sustain the most lucrative business in the world besides oil, the pharma-medical industry. An investigation made public by CNN on 26 September 2007 discovered that 56 million prescriptions each year are handed out by doctors for drugs that are not even approved by the FDA. |
Dr. Abram Hoffer, MD, FRCP (C) and Dr. Harold D. Foster, PhD
See book keywords and concepts |  This panel also supported the continued use of other cox-2 drugs, such as Celebrex and bextra, for arthritis, despite their known cardiovascular risks, so long as they also carry a black-box warning. Given the evidence that arthritis can often be successfully treated with vitamins B-3 and C or other nutrients, these decisions raise many interesting ethical issues.
Vitamin B-3 is not a drug. Drugs are developed to treat a single condition. Arthritis is not a single disease. It is caused by many factors, including toxic responses to foods. |
Melody Petersen
See book keywords and concepts | | They pointed out that Scirex's conclusion that a dose of bextra worked longer than a single dose of Percocet was not meaningful. Patients rarely receive just one dose of Percocet because it is well known it wears off in four to six hours. One of those scientists, Dr. Eric Topol, then the chairman of the Cleveland Clinic's department of cardiovascular medicine, called the studies "a contrived comparison." He said he found it "quite disquieting" that Scirex was partly owned by an advertising firm.
"If this is where clinical research is headed," Dr. |
Andreas Moritz
See book keywords and concepts | | Take the example of the arthritis drug VIOXX, or other painkillers, including CLELEBREX, ALEVE, and bextra. Isn't it astounding that these poisonous, expensive drugs could have passed all the supposedly rigorous, scientific safety tests and been sold to millions of unsuspecting arthritis sufferers, just to find out years later that they sharply increase the risk of heart attack and stroke? Could there be double standards for "rigorous testing" in the field of medical research, one for before and one for after introducing these drugs to the market? |
J. Douglas Bremner
See book keywords and concepts | | In fact, Nussmeier and colleagues studied 1,671 patients randomized to parecoxib (Dynastat, a COX-2 inhibitor that is given intravenously to surgical patients) or valde-coxib (i.e., bextra). Patients with parecoxib or valdecoxib showed a 3.7-fold increase in heart attack or stroke.5 Curt Furberg, Bruce Patsy, and Garret Fitzgerald analyzed data from this study along with data made available by the FDA and also found a greater than threefold increased risk of heart attack and stroke.6 After these studies were published, Pfizer initially argued with the results. |
Dr. Timothy Scott
See book keywords and concepts |  The Vioxx recall prompted the FDA to assemble an advisory panel during the third week of February 2005 to make a recommendation to the FDA about the entire group of Cox-2 inhibitors (Vioxx, Celebrex and bextra). Then something very surprising happened. By a very close vote (17-15) the panel of experts voted to allow Vioxx back on the market. They also voted not to remove Celebrex and bextra. The vote made headlines and seemed to say again that the safety concerns were overblown. The message seemed to be that, yes, there were risks, but they were so minimal even Merck was overreacting. |
Bill Sardi
See book keywords and concepts |  Progress Drug Research 60: 59-92, 2003] Therefore, can we assume that the use of anti-inflammatory drugs like aspirin, ibuprofen, and COX-2 inhibitors like Vioxx and bextra, will reduce the risk for cancer? A lot of doctors think so. But recent studies don't bear this out:
¦ A large study of 77,413 women could not find a preventive effect for aspirin or non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drugs against breast cancer. | | American Journal Gastroenterology 100: 1694-95, 2005]
¦ COX-2 inhibitor drugs like Vioxx and bextra are widely promoted for potential cancer prevention, but they increase the risk for heart attacks and strokes. [Journal Association Physicians India 53: 623-27, 2005] There appear to be misdirected efforts to keep COX-2 inhibitor drugs on the market by combining them with fish oil to overcome their side effects. |
Melody Petersen
See book keywords and concepts | | Yet quietly, reports of injuries caused by bextra were flowing into government offices in Maryland. In April 2005 the FDA demanded that Pfizer, which had taken over Pharmacia, remove the drug from the market. Regulators said the risks of the drug exceeded its meager benefits. By then doctors had prescribed it to millions.
All this was eerily reminiscent of another industry that attempted to create "science" to increase corporate sales. |
J. Douglas Bremner
See book keywords and concepts | | In 2005 bextra was taken off the market.)
While it's true that many drugs help people live longer and better lives, myriad others may be harmful in ways you're unaware of. Dr. Graham's testimony provided the public a fleeting glimpse of the knowledge that is normally hidden from view or frustratingly difficult for the average person to access. |
Bill Sardi
See book keywords and concepts | | For example, vitamin D inhibits COX-2, the inflammatory protein that drugs like Vioxx, bextra and others attempt to control. [Journal Steroid Biochemistry Molecular Biology 97: 31-36, 2005]
An inflammatory protein called P38 plays a very important role in prostate tumor progression. [Actas Urologia Espana 29: 769-76, 2005] There are many natural molecules, such as quercetin, resveratrol, rosemary, N-acetyl cysteine, that lower P38 levels. |
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ABOUT THE CREATOR OF NATURALPEDIA: Mike Adams, the creator of this NaturalNews Naturalpedia, is the editor of NaturalNews.com, the internet's top natural health news site, creator of the Honest Food Guide (www.HonestFoodGuide.org), a free downloadable consumer food guide based on natural health principles, author of Grocery Warning, The 7 Laws of Nutrition, Natural Health Solutions, and many other books available at www.TruthPublishing.com, creator of the earth-friendly EcoLEDs company (www.EcoLEDs.com) that manufactures energy-efficient LED lighting products, founder of Arial Software (www.ArialSoftware.com), a permission e-mail technology company, creator of the CounterThink Cartoon series (www.NaturalNews.com/index-cartoons.html) and author of over 1,500 articles, interviews, special reports and reference guides available at www.NaturalNews.com. Adams' personal philosophy and health statistics are available at www.HealthRanger.org.
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