Wiz,
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So, do we not offer drugs that have a chance of bad side effects? Don't we have to look at the overall effect? Let the patients know of any possible adverse affects and let them decide for themselves? Would you rather we not have Tysabri available as a treatment?
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The question here isn't whether we offer drugs like Tysabri to the public but making sure this same public is given all the information required BEFORE making their decision.
If you can recall PRIOR to Tysabri becoming approved on the first go around....Biogen posted their marketing plan on the internet describing how it would be the first choice of treatment and within a year, have a huge share of the MS medication world. All their development costs would be recovered within 18 months!
It's this very approach that I am concerned about....promoting the heck out of a drug and then discovering all the problems afterwards. Let's get the revenue flowing and then worry about the fall-out later. Is this fair to the MS patient and/or doc who is trying to determine if the patient should use this drug?
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For myself, it has given me back a lot of my quality of life. All of these heavy duty drugs have their chances of dangerous side effects. If I take too much aspirin I might bleed to death.
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I am glad to hear that Tysabri appears to have given you some quality of life back but wouldn't it have been better to know about these problems before you started on the drug? Again, my concern is that Biogen was aware of these potential problems but chose not to disclose them fully.
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So what do we do Harry? Take the Tysabri away? (And you know I'm not baiting you, I respect you as the caring spouse of someone with MS, your dear late wife.) Just trying to let you see the side of the patient that relies on Tysabri.
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I'm not suggesting that we take Tysabri away but perhaps the FDA should be demanding more information from companies like Biogen. We know very well why Biogen strongly minimizes the potential problems of this kind of drug...it's very bad for potential sales.
At first we were told that the PML problem was due to combining immunosuppressive drugs. Then it was because the patient had taken this kind of drug in the past.....monotherapy was perfectly safe. And now we see monotherapy patients getting PML and subjected to other immune system problems. What else don't we know about Tysabri?
I also realize that you aren't baiting me in your questions. From reading your several posts I know that you simply aren't the kind of person who would do that and I respect your opinion.
Take care.
Harry