Anti-depressant linked to crime to be withdrawn from Swedish market

The manufacturer of a powerful drug prescribed to treat depression but also linked to violent crime and drug abuse, said it was planning to withdraw the drug from the Swedish market. Anti-depressant Rohypnol, similar to Valium but many times stronger, is banned in several countries, including the United States, where it has been linked to street crime and date rapes. Its maker, Swiss pharmaceutical company Hoffman-La Roche, said the reasons for the planned withdrawal were related purely to declining sales of the drug, typically administered to treat severe sleeping disorders. “The decision is based on commercial reasons. Rohypnol is a small product for us. It stands for 0.5 percent of our total sales in Sweden,” said Roche spokeswoman Anna Lena Boucht. The Swedish government had been applying pressure on Roche after Rohypnol was linked to a string of violent crimes, including the murder of foreign minister Anna Lindh four months ago. Her attacker, Mijailo Mijailovic, who is undergoing psychiatric testing ahead of the final verdict in the Lindh murder trial, is believed to have taken a cocktail of prescription drugs before stabbing the popular politician in a Stockholm department store on September 10, 2003. The Swedish press has widely reported that Rohypnol was among the drugs found when police searched the home of the 25-year-old after his arrest. Swedish Justice Minister Thomas Bodstroem has been demanding a ban on Rohypnol since 2001 but has not been able to put together a legal case against Roche, the TT news agency reported. In Sweden a prescription drug cannot be banned on the basis of problems created by its illegal use, if it is shown to be effective when administered as intended. Oscar Grundberg, a Swedish doctor at Huddinge hospital, told AFP. “It is a very efficient soporific, that helps especially elderly people with sleeping disorders. The danger comes when the drug is taken in another way than the doctor has asked it to be taken,” he said. —AFP

Home | Infotech