According to a new report commissioned by the British government, there are an estimated 180,000 elderly people with dementia in the United Kingdom currently being treated with antipsychotic drugs such as Seroquel, Zyprexa, Risperdal and Abilify. The report found that these drugs could be responsible for as many as 1,800 deaths and 1,620 strokes each year among the elderly with dementia in the United Kingdom.
AstraZeneca paid Chicago psychiatrist Dr. Michael Reinstein $490,000 over a decade to travel the nation promoting its best-selling antipsychotic drug, Seroquel. In return, Reinstein provided the company a vast customer base: thousands of residents in Chicago-area nursing homes.
Dr. Dina Panagiotopoulos, a pediatric endocrinologist at BC Children’s who was the principal investigator in the study published in the Canadian Journal of Psychiatry, said the increased rates of obesity mean youth face a higher risk of heart disease and cholesterol.
Utah Attorney General Mark Shurtleff sued the company after a nearly four-year investigation revealed that Lilly concealed its knowledge of significant weight gain and obesity associated with the anti-psychotic medication Zyprexa. Investigators also showed that Lilly’s sales representatives illegally promoted the drug for uses not approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration.
According to a review ordered by the UK’s Department of Health, excessive use of the medication causes an estimated 1,800 deaths and almost as many strokes among older people every year. As many as many as 144,000 people suffering from dementia are being given anti-psychotic drugs unnecessarily.
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