
                         Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: SUNDAY, May 27, 1990                   TAG: 9005270250
SECTION: VIRGINIA                    PAGE: A-8   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: 
DATELINE: WASHINGTON                                LENGTH: Short

FDA OVERLOOKS DRUG HAZARDS, REPORT SAYS

Congressional investigators have found that more than half of the new drugs approved for marketing in this country have some severe or fatal side effects not found in testing, or not reported until years after the medications have been widely used.

The General Accounting Office reviewed all 198 drugs that were approved from 1976 to 1985 and subsequently marketed for a substantial period.

Of those, 102 were found to have side effects serious enough to warrant withdrawal from the market or major changes in labels to account for new dangers.

FDA officials reacted angrily to the GAO report. Dr. Robert Temple, chief of drug evaluation, said the study was intended to look at serious adverse drug reactions, but as many as 80 percent of the side effects classified as "serious" by the GAO were unimportant or very rare. - The New York Times

by CNB