John Whitehead of the Rutherford Institute makes his first appearance of the year on WINA’s Charlottesville–Right Now with Coy Barefoot. Of course, it’s the height of flu season, and Coy wants to know more about Whitehead’s recent article on Tamiflu. Whitehead points to evidence that Tamiflu may not be the wonder drug doctors purport it to be, and says the FDA has not done its job in properly labeling the drug. From his article:
It was thought that the drug, which has been used by over 30 million people worldwide, was causing some of its users to manifest very unusual behavior. For example, during the 2004 and 2005 flu seasons, two teenage boys committed suicide within hours of taking Tamiflu. The 17-year-old jumped in front of a large truck on a busy road after walking outside his house barefoot and in pajamas during a snowstorm. The 14-year-old jumped to his death from the balcony of a ninth-floor flat. Later, a teenage girl was narrowly prevented from jumping to her death from a window within days of starting a course of the flu drug. By November 2005, it had been reported that 12 Japanese children had died while on the drug and that others had experienced hallucinations, encephalitis and other symptoms.
Other topics include issues with the new cervical cancer vaccine, former Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld’s connections with the makers of Tamiflu, the rights of non-custodial parents, the legality of giving students psychological tests without their parents’ consent, and the Bush administration’s use of signing statements.