By: Jane Kirby, PA, The Independent
Wednesday, 25 June 2008
A controversial weight-loss drug has been approved for use on the NHS, it was announced today.
Rimonabant will be made available to overweight or obese patients who cannot take, or who have had no success with, two other drugs, orlistat and sibutramine.
It comes after concerns about rimonabant’s side-effects, including suicidal thoughts and depression.
Today’s news comes after the medicines watchdog said last month that it had received 720 reports of adverse drug reactions (totalling 2,123 individual reactions) in the UK since the drug launched in 2006.
Five resulted in death (one suicide, one from infection, one sudden death from an unknown cause and two heart attacks), the data, from the Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency (MHRA), showed.
Of the total number of reactions, 974 involved psychiatric disorders, of which 48 reports involved suicidal thoughts.
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