French patients sue over weight loss drug

Patients taking a controversial French weight loss drug causing the deaths of hundreds of people have filed a criminal lawsuit against the pharmaceutical giant Servier in what could prove to be the biggest French healthcare scandal of the decade.

Despite fears over the lethal side effects of the drug, Mediator stayed on the market in France for over 30 years and was only banned in 2009.

From Guardian.co.uk:

Opposition politicians are now demanding a public inquiry, accusing the government and the state health regulatory body of being too close to the pharmaceutical industry and putting lives at risk to protect the profits of big business.

Mediator was recommended to overweight people with diabetes but also prescribed as an appetite suppressant to healthy women who wanted to lose a few kilos. Between its launch in 1976 and its ban in 2009 it was taken by more than 5 million French people, subsidised by the social security system.

In 1999 a case of severe heart-valve damage in a Marseille patient using the drug was highlighted to authorities, followed by other cases across France. Spain and Italy banned the drug in 2005 over health fears and it was never allowed to be sold in the UK or US. But in France the drug stayed on the market until late last year.

The medical world is reeling from a health warning by the French government advising people taking the amphetamine derivative Mediator to immediately see their doctor.

Tags: amphetamine, appetite suppressant, Mediator, weight loss drug