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Last year psychiatrist Daniel Carlat, M.D., who recounts his adventures as a Wyeth-paid Effexor promoter in the New York Times magazine, writes that he received, as a member of Medscape, an envelope with “a brochure from Forest Laboratories advertising Lexapro, and nothing else. It was creepy, like Invasion of the Body Snatchers.”
While Lilly is known for launching the SSRI antidepressant revolution with Prozac, Cymbalta does much of the heavy lifting now with worldwide sales of $3.075 billion in 2009.
Many remember Cymbalta as the drug 19-year-old healthy clinical volunteer Traci Johnson was taking when she killed herself during trials on the Lilly campus in 2004, soon after FDA investigations into suicide-antidepressant links.
Traci had no depression history said Rev. Joel Barnaby, a spokesman for the Johnson family, who called Lilly’s decision to proceed with Cymbalta’s launch as scheduled “offensive” posturing.
The FDA said five other suicides occurred during Cymbalta clinical trials, and twice the rate of suicide attempts were seen in women prescribed the drug for stress urinary incontinence. These patients had no history of depression.
Others remember Cymbalta as the drug Carol Anne Gotbaum, daughter-in-law of New York City Public Advocate Betsy Gotbaum, was taking during her macabre death in police custody at the Phoenix Sky Harbor International Airport in 2007.
But now Lilly and WebMD are pushing Cymbalta for pain since it was approved for fibromyalgia in 2008. “Across cultures, patients who complain of pain tend to be depressed,” says the 2002 article, which calls WebMD and Lilly partners, a finding from a “huge international study by Prozac manufacturer Eli Lilly and Company.”
“Could your muscle aches be related to depression?” hawks WebMD text under the heading “Recognizing the Symptoms of Depression.” Next to it is a picture of a depressed woman with arrows pointing to the pain in her head and neck, chest, stomach, arms, hands, legs, feet, and back.
“Print out this symptom diary, and fill it out. Then take it to your doctor to discuss what may be causing your symptoms.”
This content, we’re told, is “selected and controlled by WebMD’s editorial staff” but “funded by Lilly USA.”
Martha Rosenberg is a journalist who lives in Chicago.
