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Government-backed research found that montelukast, sold under the brand name Singulair, attaches to cells in the brain that control mood, decision making, attention, impulse control and sleep.
This research was prompted by thousands of tragic stories reported by families whose children were taking montelukast over the years - including Harrison Sellick who attempted suicide at just five years old.
There have been 82 suicides linked to the drug that have been reported to the FDA's adverse event tracker since 1998 and the drug has been linked to depression, anxiety, agitation, nightmares and 'full psychosis'.
The FDA added a black box label to the drug - the strictest warning that indicates the medication can lead to death or serious injury - in March 2020, and urged doctors to communicate these risks to patients.
Montelukast was approved for medical use in the United States in 1998.It is available as a generic medication. In 2022, it was the seventeenth most commonly prescribed medication in the United States, with more than 29 million prescriptions.
Montelukast is used for a number of conditions including asthma, exercise induced bronchospasm, allergic rhinitis, and urticaria. It is mainly used as a complementary therapy in adults in addition to inhaled corticosteroids, if inhaled steroids alone do not bring the desired effect. It is also used to prevent allergic reactions and asthma flare-ups during the administration of intravenous immunoglobulin. It may also be used as an adjunct therapy in symptomatic treatment of mastocytosis. It is taken by mouth, as a tablet, chewable tablet, or as granules.
Prescriptions for montelukast have remained steady since the warning was added and the FDA said it does not plan to update the drug label based on data from the presentation, which has yet to be released publicly.
A 2017 analysis from Kiplinger, a business forecasting company, suggested that the drug had made Merck nearly $50billion in sales since it came on the market.
In early advertising, the company said the side effects were so benign they were 'similar to a sugar pill,' while the label said the effect on the brain was minimal.
originally posted by: marg6043
Big pharma is not in the business of finding cures they are in the business of having you as part of their money gravy train for life.
In the Netherlands during 1998 and 1999, mefloquine was respectively the most and the second most cited drug in spontaneous reports of drug-related illness made to the Lareb Pharmacovigilance Foundation.
A survey of the recent literature shows that mefloquine has been causally associated with 19 deaths in users, including three suicides
Though still prescribed in most countries, both for preventing and treating malaria, Lariam is now known to cause neurotoxicity.