WARNING ON TB DRUG

Press, Volume CII, Issue 30325, 28 December 1963, Page 13

WARNING ON TB DRUG

Deformities In Animals

(N.Z. Press Assn.—Copyright) LONDON, December 27.

Doctors throughout Britain have been warned about giving pregnant women a drug widely used to treat tuberculosis, the “Daily Mail’’ reported.

The manufacturers, May and Baker, had found that big doses of the drug. Ethionamide, could produce deformities in the offspring of animals. the newspaper’s science correspondent wrote.

The general manager of the firm's pharmaceutical specialities,’ Mr R. Wood, had issued the warning. But in a letter to the “Pharmaceutical Journal” he had made it clear that “available clinical evidence indicates that those women who have received Ethionamide during pregnancyhave produced normal infants,” the correspondent said.

Two brands of drugs containing Ethionamide are issued by May and Baker— Trescatyl and Trescazide.

Trescatyl could be bought over the counter without a doctor’s prescription, the “Daily Mail” said. But the firm had applied for it to be listed by the Home Office as an “official poison.” A May and Baker spokesman said: “Our tests, with doses eight to 10 times that for patients, revealed abnormal effects on the offspring of certain types of animals.”