Drug companies will never learn their lesson. The front page of today's New York Times( Sun., December17th, 2006) disclosed that Eli Lilly suppressed information that its drug Zyprexa was linked to obesity and diabetes.
Apparently, Eli Lilly kept important information from doctors about its drug Zyprexa causing weight gain, links to obesity and risk factors for diabetes. Consumers need to learn the lesson of "Follow the Money". Zyprexa is by far Lilly's best selling product, with sales of about $4.2 billion, and about two million people worldwide taking the drug.
The documents, given to the New York Times by a lawyer representing mentally ill patients, show that Lilly kept important information from the medical community. As early as 1999, the documents show that Lilly worried that side effects from Zyprexa, whose chemical name is olanzapine, would hurt sales.
“Olanzapine-associated weight gain and possible hyperglycemia is a major threat to the long-term success of this critically important molecule,” Dr. Alan Breier wrote in a November 1999 e-mail message to two-dozen Lilly employees that announced the formation of an “executive steering committee for olanzapine-associated weight changes and hyperglycemia.” Hyperglycemia is high blood sugar.
When it was introduced, Zyprexa was the third and most heralded of the atypical antipsychotics. With psychiatrists eager for new treatments for schizophrenia, bipolar disorder, and dementia, Zyprexa’s sales soared.
But as sales grew, reports rolled in to Lilly and drug regulators that the medicine caused massive weight gain in many patients and was associated with diabetes. Of course Lilly has denied any wrong-doing, despite years of criticism from the American Diabetes Association.
Some psychiatrists say they no longer believe the information Lilly offers.