Thomas Laughren, FDA Director of Psychiatric Products, Retired

Alliance for Human Research Protection (AHRP)
Advancing Honest and Ethical Medical Research
 www.ahrp.org

FYI

Thomas Laughren, FDA Director of psychiatric products, under whose watch--since 1983--the most toxic, therapeutically worthless psychotropic drugs became the pharmaceutical industry's most profitable blockbuster drugs, has retired from the FDA.

As documents uncovered during litigation have demonstrated, the second generation antidepressants (SSRIs) and antipsychotics gained their market success mostly through illegal promotion, concealment of these drugs' severe hazards, and the fact that the cost of these drugs has been primarily borne by taxpayers through Medicaid and Medicare.

In 2007 and again in 2008, The Alliance for Human Research Protection wrote letters of complaint to the FDA Commissioner documenting the promotional activities of Thomas Laughren who actively participated in industry-convened panels, who  penned his  was name to ghostwritten, industry-sponsored promotional articles encouraging physicians to expand prescribing of these drugs, and who concealed vital safety information from FDA an Advisory panel, and repeatedly overruled FDA medical experts, and approved expanded use of these drugs for children, disregarding safety concerns.

Read AHRP Letters of complaint to Commissioner Andrew Eschenbach in 2007 about the appearance of a major conflict of interest:  http://www.ahrp.org/cms/content/view/887/9/

Further amplified in 2008:  http://www.ahrp.org/cms/content/view/888/9/

Vera Sharav