'Feathers' has since left PE, but his legacy is continued embarrassment for his former employers. You may remember his making these claims in what looked suspiciously like a paid-for commercial for Pfizer products.
Varenicline is the most cost-effective treatment option in the NHS Stop Smoking Service. Studies consistently demonstrate it to be superior to any other therapy, but it is only used in 20% of cases. Varenicline should be offered as first line drug treatment for all patients wishing to quit smokingWell, Feathers may have seen 'no good reason', but then considering the pre-determined outcome he was aiming for, he didn't look very far.
[...]
The NHS Stop Smoking Service should offer varenicline as first line drug treatment for all patients wishing to quit smoking.
[...]
the [NHS] only prescribes varenicline in 20% of cases, since it is often confined to patients who have failed with NRT. There is no good reason why all patients should not be offered it.
A study just out couldn't be more clear how very wrong Featherstone was.
A new study finds that the smoking-cessation drug varenicline (Pfizer's Chantix) has too poor a safety profile to make it suitable for first-line use. Researchers from Wake Forest Baptist Medical Center, and other research centers in the US, found the drug, known as Champix outside the US, was 8 times more likely to result in reports of suicidal behavior or depression than nicotine replacement products. They report their findings in the 2 November issue of PLoS One, an online journal of the Public Library of Science.Oh dear. Not good news for Policy Exchange, that.
[Study co-author Dr Curt D.] Furberg and colleagues found that 90% of all reported suicides linked to smoking cessation drugs since 1998 involved varenicline, even though the drug had only been on the market for 4 of the almost 13 years they covered.Hmm. Pretty unequivocal then. And it just gets worse. It seems that Featherstone's advice was not just wrong, but deeply irresponsible to boot.
Lead author Thomas J. Moore, senior scientist at the Institute for Safe Medication Practices, says:Plenty of 'good reasons' there, eh Henry?
"While suicidal behavior or depression appear to be prominent side effects of varenicline, they are by no means the only safety issues."
He explains that the drug already carries a warning about the fact studies have found links between its use and aggression and violence.
"Its effects on vision, cognition and motor control and other risks have led to its being banned for airline pilots, air traffic controllers, military pilots and missile crews, and restricted for truck drivers,"
It's been a year since Feathers left, but his vested interest idiocy is still making Policy Exchange blush.
What a plonker.
6 comments:
You're making the mistake of assuming that these people would be embarrassed by any such lies which you or VGIF uncover - for them, the end justifies the means.
See also: bankers, EU, global warmenists, blah blah blah.
But too, it's to combat the most deadly disease in the history of mankind, namely the disease of smoking. If varenicline causes so much depression to the point that there will be nothing left inside the brain chemistry to permit any joy or pleasure from smoking to take root, then it will have done its job and Pfizer will be that much richer if NHS is forced to prescribe it 100% of the time to all patients inflicted by the monstrous disease of smoking. This might work to combat the diseases of drinking, eating, laughing and non-conformist thinking too. Pfizer should commission a new study to accompany the one they just commissioned to CDC to convince everyone that shutting down everything in the economy and plunging it into bankruptcy, so that all profit from now on flows directly to Pfizer is actually economically beneficial and helpful in destroying nation states, so a one world dictate under UN can become possible. Meantime, the man in the street still belives it's all about second hand smoke and ghastly poison is their fear. What a laugh this world has become, what a laugh.
"the drug, known as Champix outside the US, was 8 times more likely to result in reports of suicidal behavior or depression than nicotine replacement products. ... Furberg and colleagues found that 90% of all reported suicides linked to smoking cessation drugs since 1998 involved varenicline [Champix}, even though the drug had only been on the market for 4 of the almost 13 years they covered."
Pretty damning picture. I wonder if they'll eventually uncover a financial conflict of interest for Featherbrain? Any hints of that yet?
-MJM
Nick who?
Oops. That should have been on the later post. Ah well!
I don't need Champix or whatever they want to call it to be depressed and suicidal - the smoking ban itself did that extremely well!
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