Acetaminophen: It’s not safe, and now we know it’s not even effective

The big risks this common drug poses might all be for nothing

We know that acetaminophen is a very dangerous drug.

It lands 78,000 people in the ER every year and is the leading cause of liver failure in the U.S.

So we know that it’s not “safe.”

But at least it’s “effective,” right?

Well…

One of the most common reasons your doctor might tell you to take acetaminophen is for lower back pain. And believe it or not, no one ever took the time to find out if it really works for that.

So when researchers in Australia set out to prove how great this drug works for back pain, they got some really surprising results.

“Our results — based on over 1600 patients — provide clear evidence that acetaminophen is ineffective for low back pain.” That’s how Dr. Christopher Williams summed up the results of his study.

Now acetaminophen — Tylenol — is what most doctors tell their patients to take for back pain.

But it’s not like Dr. Williams and his team didn’t try hard enough.

In the group assigned to take acetaminophen, they were told to take a daily dose of 3990 mg! That’s unbelievable. Even the FDA says that the absolute maximum dose of this drug is 4000 mg a day.

And a daily dose that high is one experts say is pushing the envelope for needing a liver transplant. That is if you’re lucky.

But even at that super-high dose, it was useless.

All three groups in this study, the ones who took the giant liver-damaging dose, the ones who took the drug only when needed, and the ones who took a placebo pill, had similar results. It took them all the same time to recover, and they all reported the same amount of pain.

So the researchers said that maybe 4000 mg a day of acetaminophen would have been more effective! You can see they were really hoping this study would turn out differently.

And that’s because it was financed by GlaxoSmithKline.

Now Glaxo makes an acetaminophen drug overseas called Panadol, so you can be sure they didn’t intend this study to get the kind of result it got!

And because the study was published in the prestigious journal Lancet, Glaxo wasted no time in chiming in. It said that the study shouldn’t change acetaminophen’s status as the “first line” treatment for back pain.

Right, Glaxo, even if it doesn’t work!

And McNeil, the company that makes Tylenol, is just as unhappy. It said that doctors should “re-consider the study results,” whatever that means.

Big Pharma is also getting its buddies together to write letters to the Lancet. One group, from a university in the Netherlands, said that no changes in recommending acetaminophen should be made because of this “high-quality trial” with “clear” findings.

They just don’t give up now, do they?

But even the critics couldn’t find fault with the study, or its results.

Of course, this study only adds to the reasons for avoiding drugs that contain acetaminophen. For years I’ve been warning you about the very real dangers it poses.

At best, taking acetaminophen is a risky proposition. And taking 4000 mg a day can be a deadly one.

Yet, because it’s in so many different products, like headache, cold and pain remedies, it’s not at all hard to exceed to that potentially lethal dose.

Even the FDA, which has been protecting this sacred cow for decades, finally said this year that prescription drugs with over 325 mg of acetaminophen “are no longer considered safe.”

And now, we know that not only aren’t they “safe” — they’re not even effective.

Sources:
“Acetaminophen doesn’t reduce lower-back pain, study suggests” Rachael Rettner, July 24, 2014, Fox News, foxnews.com