All,
We were recently contacted by a woman who has started an online petition to have Propecia removed from the market. Below is the email we received:
Signed it. There’s no reason everyone else here shouldn’t, as well.
And forward it to every single living person you know.
I don’t think propecia should be removed from the market. I think it should come with a HUGE warning label disclosing all known side effects and the severity and possibility of the persistence of these side effects. I think doctors should be brought up to speed on what the drug really does, and truly educate/warn patients about the risks/benefits of taking this drug. I think Merck should come clean with everything they’ve known about this drug they’ve modeled from hermaphroditic children with 5AR deficiency and throw all their efforts and financial resources into figuring out the precise mechanism of the persistent sexual and cognitive side effects and expediently help to heal the PFS sufferers out there, compensate them for their health bills and then some.
But I don’t want to take away the right of a transgender considering a sex change to utilize this drug; I don’t want to take away the right of a 70 year old man who is so burdened with nighttime urination to make an informed decision to weigh the cost and benefits of this drug and possibly alleviate his BPH with this drug (if this is the option he feels is best). Informed consent is all anyone ever asks for: Tell me what you really know, how this thing really works, what ALL known side effects are. If this data had been presented to me, I would not have chosen to take finasteride. Even after having started finasteride, plenty of time had passed to where there were PFS reports that could have been communicated to doctors and myself to allow me to quit the drug while I was still ahead. This is what bugs me. I don’t care to legislate someone’s informed choice to consume sugar or tobacco or a pharmaceutical: just don’t lie or obscure the truth surrounding what those things do in your marketing. Don’t fudge the data, don’t suppress what you know, don’t ignore the patient feedback of side effects.
I think attempting to take this drug off the market is the wrong approach. You risk the backlash of all the insecure balding guys (who are fine, or think they’re fine now – time will tell) who want to keep this drug on the market along with the aforementioned groups. If these groups of people knowingly elect to use this drug with full disclosure of what it does, what it can cause, etc., then it’s their choice.
I’m not gonna sit around here and debate this. You either get the nuance of what I’m saying, or are ruled purely by emotion / hatred for propecia and Merck. And I understand that – they suck, it’s not fair – but just because they were unethical doesn’t mean I will change my principles.
Xhorndog, the groups you are referencing can always get Finasteride in generic form via Indian manufacturers etc.
I think what this woman wants to do is have Merck’s brand name Propecia removed from the market for hair loss treatment (controversial risk/benefit ratio for a cosmetic condition), not for the other intended purposes you mentioned (transgender therapy, androgen deprivation for prostate cancer, BPH treatment).
Even if Propecia were removed from market, Finasteride will still be avail to those who want to take it in generic form… therefore, your concerns are a moot point.
I agree with Horndog. There’s no way you can take this drug off the market. It really shouldn’t be targeted as a Hairloss drug as it’s purpose is BPH, of course it’s great revenue for the pharmaceutical cunts.
There should be atleast regulation on precausions to prescribing this Drug, my Dr didn’t even check my DHT and said “it doesn’t matter”. I totally agree on label changes to the extreme defintley a black label listing.
No wonder young men are getting screwed taking a drug designed for BPH roughting them of Vitality hormone DHT and Shrinking there prostates.
Oh, by the way the TGA Australia are working on label changes at the moment.
I never took this drug. I don’t know what this is good for? My brother in_law took it for prostate problem and his life has ruined since. He can not work anymore, had to quit his job because of weakness.I dont know his sexual condition as he is senior to me and we don’t discuss these issues at family level but I am sure he is suffering silently. I guess many prostate patients are paying big price for this drug but doctors don’t pay any attention to their complaints and attribute every thing to their ongoing prostate problem and depression. My brother_in_law was in very big pain and saying he was going to die like many of us.
well this died fast. Not even 50 sigs, pathetic… and you can do it anon if you want.
It seems like the 2,000 or so members we have do not follow the site that often. Perhaps we can send this petition in an email blast?
I signed with an alias.
it seems like the required 100,000 signatures may be a tall order given all of the current circumstances… but we can still try
Have that many of the members on this forum dropped off the radar? What has happened to so many of them? It concerns me, to say the least.
I just had a thought about removing propecia from the market… While this would be a great result (not for us) it could potentially screw alot of other guys up since it seems alot of us got screwed over after finasteride withdrawal. Ofcourse proscar will probably always be available, but if guys simply cant get propecia then theres a good change a large percentage of users may crash?
Thoughts?
I can’t see that ever happening, but theoretically, if all the guys who are currently taking propecia couldn’t get any more then we would most definitely see A LOT of guys experiencing difficulties. At that point the can of worms would be all over the fecking place. The true magnitude of the problem and its impact post-propecia is masked by the very nature of the drug i.e. guys have to continue to take it to keep their hair, and if they aren’t experiencing major side effects whilst on the drug and have invested money in their hair, they would in all likelihood continue to take the drug, hence pfs is under-reported.
If they leave the drug on the market, but have extensive blood test that need to be done before taking it. This could help in finding a cure. The best way to find a cure for this drug is to test 1000s of people before they take the drug and then if 1 or more of the 1000 develops PFS, run test and see how it differs from there original blood work, and since know one has the 50,000,000 dollars to fund this i say let merck do the work, keep the drug on the market but push for extensive blood test before taking the drug.
If they retire the drug from the market, pfs sufferers would have very little chances of mantaining the interest on this disease and researchers in search for a “cure”. Labels should be updated immediately with all the side effects that we know of (now many are listed), and all patients should be warned of the dangers of this drug. Then that’s not my problem if someone decides to take it anyway: there was practically no listed side effects when I took finasteride.
PFS sufferers deserve justice that’s true, but most of all they want to heal.
This is why, I’m sorry, I will not sign the petition.
You raise good points tab but there are ulterior motives to the petition, such as raising awareness about the drug’s dangers and letting the world know Propecia can cause serious, permanent damage. This petition won’t get Propecia pulled, but it can help to raise awareness.
I don’t know, I think the best way is to have everyone report their side effects to the authorities, althought we know what many authorities stink like. I do not feel well in signing a petition that might have (however improbably and despite the actual results) the opposite effect of what would help us. Also, many drugs in fact can have tremendous labeled side effects, and they are still on the market (this is true), with doctors who don’t bother even prescribing exams before drug prescriptions and alert the patient of possible seizures. Worse, it happened to me to talk to a doctor telling me to don’t read the labels of a drug. This is fool and I think this is all related to economic interests. I think that at the time this petition gets enough signatures to raise awarness, then there is a possible risk that it has the effects it’s meant to if it reaches the eyes of some politician. Either way, this will 99,9 % surely not change the rotten the actual health care environment stinks of. My understanding is that drugs are OFFICIALLY the only product capable of helping people and doctors are formed in this optics. In many cases however drugs do enslave people to new drugs. The more you take, the more you get fucked and the more you will need. My girlfriend too ended up with many problems after taking a birth control pill and needed to use new drugs to fight the sides. She is now worse than a pfs sufferer. Too bad and she is surely not the only one. Unfortunately it will take far more than this to change this world. I would prefer signing a petition that points out the limits of patent driven medical care and aims at changing this system.
Sorry for the divagation.
Hello everyone,
My name is Sarah and I started the petition that was posted. I wanted to come on here and encourage all of you who haven’t signed to sign and to ask those who you know to do the same. I understand that some of you may feel discouraged that there have not been as many signatures on the petition as expected within this amount of time, however many people are not familiar with the effects of Propecia/PFS, so I need your help to bring about awareness which was one of my goals in creating the petition. Also please sign the petition with your real first and last name, if you are not comfortable making your signature public you are given the option not to display it however it will show up on the official petition that I will send.
Although I can not understand what you are all going through, I have seen the hardships my fiance goes through because of PFS and together we need to make all the effort we can to show the severity of the harm Propecia has done to you all and many others.
Many petitions have brought about change. Let’s make this one of them.
I signed it. Least I could do. I’m no coward.