MDs, Drug Co's Selling Cancer, Strokes to Women Via NY Transfer News * All the News That Doesn't Fit Wyeth Stock Plummets on News of Danger in Hormones for Women [Contributing to the collapse of the empire's economy this week, Wyeth Pharmaceuticals saw its stock plummet after this alarming story was released. Researchers actually halted, 3 years early, an 8-year study of long-term combination hormone replacement therapy in post-menopausal women for problems such as osteoporosis and coronary heart disease, and recommended women who were taking the hormones stop them. Why? All those hard-sell Patti LaBelle ads to the contrary, HRT doesn't prevent coronary heart disease, and even worse, it appears to cause an enormous increase in rates of breast cancer, stroke, and pulmonary embolism. These results were found across all ethnic groups studied. The Australian Government reacted immediately with a warning that women should stop this combination hormone "therapy" for normal aging. Feminist and women's health activists will not be surprised by this news. Aging is not a disease. Menopause is a normal stage of life. There is no fountain of youth. Keeping humans alive to age 100+ is not normal or sensible, and expecting to remain "young" into your 80s and 90s is absurdly unrealistic. During the second wave of feminism in the US, women vowed to end the tyranny of a male medical establishment, and scorned the trash sold to them by drug companies, gynecologists and plastic surgeons. No more unnecessary hysterectomies, tranquilizers, death-dealing hormones for contraception and menopause symptoms. What happened?] * Reuters via Yahoo - July 9, 2002 Hormones Raises Heart Disease, Cancer Risk - Study By Maggie Fox, Health and Science Correspondent WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Women wondering whether to take hormone replacement therapy got a clear answer on Tuesday: Don't, if the goal is to lower the risk of heart disease and other chronic illness. Healthy women who take combined hormone replacement therapy after menopause increase their risk of breast cancer, stroke, blood clots and heart disease, researchers said. The risks are so high the federal government stopped a trial of women taking hormone replacement therapy, or HRT, and issued a warning to doctors and patients. "Women should not start or continue to use the therapy to prevent heart disease," Dr. Jacques Rossouw of the National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute, who helped lead the study, told a news conference. "The findings show that it doesn't work. In fact, the therapy increases the chance of a heart attack or stroke, Additionally, it increases the risk of cancer and blood clots," he said. The study, published in a special online edition of the Journal of the American Medical Association, is the second blow this month to HRT, which is taken by more 13.5 million American women. Doctors issued a final report last week confirming the combination of estrogen and progestin does not protect women from heart disease after menopause. The study of 16,600 women nationwide found that HRT does lower the risk of osteoporosis and of colon cancer, but it raised the number of strokes by 41 percent, heart attacks by 29 percent and breast cancer cases by 26 percent. WOMEN MAY BE FRIGHTENED "These data are bound to sound frightening to some women," Rossouw said. But he said the risks built up over a population and were not especially high for an individual woman. "The increased risk of breast cancer for each woman in the ... study who was taking estrogen plus progestin therapy, for instance, was actually very small. It was less than a tenth of a percent per year," he said. For every 10,000 women who take the hormones for a year, seven extra have coronary heart disease "events" such as a heart attack, eight more develop breast cancer and eight more suffer a stroke, as compared to women not taking hormones. Rossouw said it may be safe to take combined HRT for a short period. "But it is very hard to pin down what is a safe period," he added. Wyeth, which makes the Prempro brand of combined HRT used in the study, said most women take it for less than the five years the study lasted. "The average duration of therapy for woman taking Prempro is 33 months," Dr. Victoria Kusiak, vice president of clinical affairs for the company, said on a telephone interview. "Fifteen percent stay on for more than four years." She said a company survey found 16 percent of women are being prescribed HRT to prevent heart disease, and 90 percent get their first prescription for hormones to manage immediate symptoms such as hot flashes and vaginal dryness. The researchers said women must decide for themselves how serious their immediate symptoms are, and whether the benefits of the hormones outweigh the risks of chronic disease. Wyeth said about 8.5 million women take its hormone products each month -- 5 million take estrogen-only Premarin, and 2.7 million take Prempro. The researchers said they had contacted the U.S. Food and Drug Administration and hoped Wyeth would change the labeling on Prempro to reflect their findings. Kusiak said the current label was "consistent with" the findings but said the company would review it. "The company will be evaluating the results of this study against the label and making any appropriate changes," she said. "We hope they will do the right thing," Rossouw said. Women need to look at alternative treatments to prevent heart disease, osteoporosis and other aging-associated diseases, said Marcia Stefanick, an associate professor of medicine at Stanford University in California, who led the study. "We need to clearly separate treatment for diseases of aging in women," she said. The estrogen-progestin combination was formulated because taking estrogen alone increases the risk of cancer of the uterus. For women who have had hysterectomies and who need HRT, estrogen alone may be safer, the researchers said. "A separate clinical trial of estrogen alone is continuing," Stefanick said. Shares of Madison, New Jersey-based Wyeth closed down $11.94 at 37.30 $a share on the New York Stock Exchange, a four-year low. AP via Yahoo - July 9, 2002 Health agency says type of hormone therapy hurts instead of helping women's hearts and causes breast cancer By LAURAN NEERGAARD, AP Medical Writer WASHINGTON - Government scientists abruptly ended America's biggest study of a type of hormone replacement therapy, saying long-term use of estrogen and progestin significantly increases women's risk of breast cancer, strokes and heart attacks. Six million American women use this hormone combination, either for short-term relief of hot flashes and other menopausal symptoms or because of doctors' long-standing assumptions that long-term use would prevent heart disease and brittle bones and generally keep women healthier longer. In fact, there are serious risks to using the hormones for years, risks that far outweigh the few benefits, the National Institutes of Health announced Tuesday. The hormones harm, rather than protect, the heart - they actually increase previously healthy women's risk of a heart attack by 29 percent and of a stroke by a stunning 41 percent. They also increase women's chances of breast cancer by 26 percent. On the good side, the hormones cut by a third the risk of colon cancer and hip fractures - but there are other, safer ways to fend off those illnesses, doctors noted. So the NIH stopped the 16,600-woman study three years early, and is advising other women who use the estrogen-progestin combination to ask their doctors if they, too, should quit. "We want to get the word out to women and their doctors that long-term use of this therapy could be harmful," said Dr. Jacques Rossouw, acting director of the NIH's Women's Health Initiative, which sponsored the study. Women may still want to use the hormones for a short period to treat menopause symptoms such as hot flashes, he said. But for how long? "There is no really safe period," he acknowledged, noting that the heart attack risk hit during women's first year of taking the hormones. "As short a period as you can get away with in order to manage the menopausal transition." Other researchers also were negative. "We recommend that clinicians stop prescribing this combination for long-term use," wrote Dr. Suzanne Fletcher of Harvard Medical School in an editorial accompanying the study results posted on the Web site of the Journal of the American Medical Association. "Risks from the drug add up over time." The study's leaders stressed that women shouldn't panic because personal risk is pretty small. In one year, for every 10,000 women who take the estrogen-progestin combination, there will be eight more breast cancers, eight more strokes and seven more heart attacks - and six fewer colon cancers and five fewer hip fractures - compared with 10,000 women who didn't take the pills. However, because millions take the hormones, those numbers can add up to thousands of illnesses, Rossouw noted. To use estrogen or not has long been a vexing question for women entering menopause. While the study seems definitive, it doesn't settle all the questions: _What about women who use estrogen alone? The NIH is letting a second, smaller study of those women continue for now, saying so far the balance of risks and benefits remains uncertain. Only women who have had hysterectomies can use estrogen alone, because it causes uterine cancer unless balanced by progestin. _How do the risks stack up for short-term use? In the latest study, the cardiovascular risk actually jumped within the first year of use while the cancer risk didn't appear until around year four. "The message still goes back to 'treat your individual needs,'" said study co-author Jennifer Hays of the Baylor College of Medicine. "If you can't sleep for three weeks (because of night sweats) and short-term therapy at a low dose helps you with that, quality of life is an important thing." _This study used Prempro, the most popular estrogen-progestin combination. But what about lower-dose pills or even skin patches? Without testing each, "you can get wrong answers," cautioned study co-author Dr. Norman Lasser of the University of Medicine and Dentistry of New Jersey, who wants drug companies to do such testing. "It's going to be a while 'til we know what's safe." Wyeth Pharmaceuticals, which makes Prempro and other estrogen supplements, said the main reason women start hormone therapy is to relieve hot flashes, night sweats or vaginal problems. "It is important to recognize the critical role" the hormones play for those women, said Wyeth vice president Dr. Victoria Kusiak. * AP via Yahoo - July 11, 2002 Australia warns against long-term use of hormone replacement therapy SYDNEY, Australia - Australia issued an urgent warning Thursday against long-term hormone replacement therapy, following U.S. findings that its risks outweigh its benefits. U.S. scientists this week warned that long-term doses of estrogen and progestin significantly increase women's risk of breast cancer, strokes and heart attacks. In a swift response, Australian government officials recommended reviews of all hormone replacement therapy trials and of the use of combined estrogen and progestin to prevent bone loss. The Australian Medical Association said 600,000 women are on some form of hormone treatment and that the government's warning was premature. "It will unnecessarily, in our view, panic more women," said the association's federal vice president Trevor Mudge. "Women need to sit back and wait for a careful, sensible review," he said. "It's not something to be decided by a press release two days after a study that hasn't yet even been published in a medical journal." The Australian government scientists said short-term use of hormones to treat menopause symptoms was still appropriate. ================================================================= NY Transfer News Collective * A Service of Blythe Systems Since 1985 - Information for the Rest of Us 339 Lafayette St., New York, NY 10012 http://www.blythe.org e-mail: nyt@blythe.org ================================================================= nytenv-07.13.02-19:28:50-6976