It may seem unbelievable but there are more than 250
diseases that can be caused by the very medicines designed to treat and cure
illness. You may well ask, "Why is this possible?" The reasons are
not difficult to understand. Over the past twenty-five years or so, many
hundreds of new com- pounds have been developed for treating and preventing
disease. Many are powerful and complicated substances.
Their very effectiveness depends upon their great potency
and complexity. In some instances, trouble has come unexpectedly because a
powerful A Special Word about medicine taking new agents was not tested
fully under every conceivable circumstance. Thus, for example, thalidomide
seemed to be an excellent and harmless tranquilizing agent in most people, but
when it was used by pregnant women it had terrible effects on their unborn
children. Another reason for drug-induced illness is that human beings do have
tendencies to develop allergic or sensitivity responses. These vary
considerably, just as they do for foods. One person may eat eggs until the hens
scream for mercy-and enjoy them with impunity; another person, allergic to
them, cannot eat one without developing some upset.
And so with other foods
Because of sensitivity problems, a medicine that is highly
beneficial for 95 percent of the population may cause trouble, even potentially
serious trouble, for the remaining 5 percent. A good example is penicillin,
clearly a lifesaving drug. It has, indeed, probably saved well over a million
lives since its discovery. But it also has caused severe sensitivity re- actions
in scores of thousands of people and has taken the lives of thousands.
As you may have noticed, physicians today inquire carefully
about possible previous sensitivity reactions to penicillin before
administering or prescribing it. Just as some people, after repeated exposure,
become allergic to rag- weed pollen or to poison ivy, so some, after being
helped once or even several times by an antibiotic, may develop allergic
reactions to the com- pound. Usually the problem is mild-skin rash, hives, or slight
fever- and disappears once the drug is stopped. Occasionally, however, there
are anaphylactic, or shock like, reactions which are life-threatening, and
these can be overcome only if heroic measures-adrenaline and other
injections-are used in time.
Still considered the single most valuable antibiotic,penicillin is a major allergy producer because it has been so widely used. It
is estimated that 10 percent of Americans have become sensitized to the drug. Still another
reason for undesirable reactions is that no drug is 100 percent
specific-hitting the bull's-eye, so to speak. In the course of countering the
problem for which it is being used, it may produce other effects, and these
have to be reckoned with. Consider, for example, the gastrointestinal
upsets-cramps, diarrhea, sore mouth, rectal itch-which may occur after use of
many antibiotics.
They can come about because of an upset in the natural germbalance in the body. Many harmless bacteria are always present in the
gastrointestinal tract. Some, in fact, are essential to digestion; some
manufacture vitamins. When a potent antibiotic is introduced to fight infection,
it may also decimate this normal bacterial population. Moreover, these friendly
bacteria serve another purpose in the body.
