Are the medications you take safe?
- A Harvard University physician-researcher, Jerry Avorn, argues that the FDA’s approval process for prescription drugs needs to be strengthened.
- The Accelerated Approval Program, introduced in the 1990s, has allowed over half of new drugs onto the market without rigorous proof of effectiveness.
- Avorn cites numerous examples of ineffective or poorly effective medications, including a cold medicine that doesn’t de-congest and billion-dollar cancer treatments with limited benefits.
- The controversial Alzheimer’s drug Aduhelm is another example, approved despite no clear cognitive benefits.
- Avorn’s book “Rethinking Medications: Truth, Power and the Drugs We Take” explores these issues and raises questions about the safety and value of medications in your medicine cabinet.
In a new podcast episode, a doctor argues we need to strengthen the FDA’s approval process on certain prescription drugs.
For a more than a century, the Food and Drug Administration has worked to protect public health. In his research, Harvard University physician-researcher Jerry Avorn has examined how the FDA’s once-rigorous gold standard approval process has been affected by a powerful shortcut known as the Accelerated Approval Program—originally designed for desperate AIDS and cancer patients.
He says that change in the 1990s has allowed more than half of all new drugs onto the market before drug companies have proven they actually help people.
In his new book Rethinking Medications: Truth, Power and the Drugs We Take (Simon & Schuster, 2025), Avorn cites numerous examples: from a cold medicine that doesn’t de-congest to billion-dollar cancer treatments that only shrink lab results to the controversial Alzheimer’s drug Aduhelm—approved despite no clear cognitive benefits.
In this episode, Avorn explores whether some prescriptions in your medicine cabinet are safe, effective, and worth the money:
Read the transcript for this episode.
Source: University of Chicago
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