Side effects of
insulin injections revealed
By
JULIE ROBOTHAM Medical Writer,
and agencies
Wednesday,
10 Mar 1999 -
From section: News And Features
Publication:
Sydney Morning Herald
Up
to 40,000 Australian diabetics
may unwittingly be suffering
adverse side effects from taking
genetically engineered synthetic
insulin, suggests British
research completed six years ago
which has just been revealed.
But the availability of
animal-derived alternatives,
which doctors agree suit some
patients better, is about to be
further limited by the
withdrawal of the main brand of
cattle-derived "beef"
insulin from the local market.
Novo Nordisk will withdraw from
the market in July, citing
commercial reasons.
"Pork"
insulin was withdrawn in 1990,
though the firm makes it
available to some people on
"compassionate
grounds".
The
UK research, commissioned by the
British Diabetics Association,
has found up to 10 per cent of
diabetes patients may suffer
side effects - the most serious
of which is a dangerous loss of
the ability to recognise they
are about to lose consciousness
- as a result of taking
synthetic "human"
insulin. This has almost
completely superseded insulins
derived from pigs or cows. The
research was based on studies of
3,000 diabetics after they
switched to human insulin.
Injected
daily, insulin replaces a
hormone, usually produced by the
pancreas, for people whose
bodies do not manufacture it
naturally. Without it, diabetes
is potentially fatal.
The
manager of educational services
for the NSW branch of Diabetes
Australia, Ms Bernadette
Lowther, said: "The
majority of people have no
problems with the transfer to
human insulin. For a small
minority we hear reports that
the quality of life was impaired
."
Supply
changes for beef insulin, which
is understood to be used by
about 3,000 of Australia’s
more than 400,000 diagnosed
diabetics, would affect the
elderly the most, Ms Lowther
said.
Several concerned
doctors had contacted the
organisation.
"This
is a significant issue for older
people who have controlled their
diabetes very well on one
injection a day," she said.
The tendency was for people to
need to inject more frequently
up to four times a day - when
they switched to human insulin.
The medical director of Novo
Nordisk, Dr John Miller, said
there was no evidence that
either form of insulin was
superior to the other. But human
insulin was cheaper and safer to
produce as it was guaranteed
free of animal viruses. The
professor of diabetes at
Melbourne’s Monash University,
Professor Paul Zimmet, said the
number of people who genuinely
needed animal insulin was
"minuscule". However,
switching drugs could cause
problems because the volume of
synthetic insulin required was
usually lower, which not all
doctors understood.
Mr
Ron Walker, 67, of Allawah, says
the two years he spent on human
insulin were "the most
disastrous period of my
life". He used the
synthetic drug around 1990 when
pork insulin was first
withdrawn. He lost consciousness
several times without warning
and eventually insisted on using
beef insulin. Beef insulin will
continue to be supplied by
Rhone-Poulenc Rorer, which had
also planned to leave the market
but reversed the decision after
renegotiating its price.
Or
this:
In
today’s (3/10/99) copy of the
English newspaper, The Guardian,
is an article that has been
summarized as follows:
"Diabetics not
told of Synthetic Insulin Risk
Evidence
that thousands of diabetics may
have suffered a deterioration in
their health from synthetic
insulin has been withheld by the
British Diabetics Association. A
report, commissioned by the
association and completed six
years ago, highlights the
dangers faced by about 10% of
the 150,000 diabetics who had
been switched from the
traditional animal-derived
insulin to the synthetic
variety. Some of those adversely
affected began to go into comas
known as hypoglycaemic episodes.
Some suffered severe injuries, a
few crashed their cars and
others believed they would have
died had they not been rescued
as they lay unconscious. The
association did not publish the
report because it claims it was
too alarmist. The manufacturers
of synthetic insulin, Novo
Nordisk and Eli Lilly, deny it
has negative effects. But
diabetes expert Dr Matthew Kiln,
a south London GP who was a
member of the committee set up
by the BDA to look at the
side-effects, said the
association had failed in its
duty to protect and represent
the interests of diabetics by
not publishing the committee’s
findings in full. He added that
doctors who understand the issue
have been quietly switching some
patients back to animal insulin,
but thousands of others are
suffering from lack of
choice."
BTW,
Humalog® improves hypoglycemia
awareness because it is LESS
"human" than Pork!!
(Pork has one amino acid
different, Humalog has a lysine
where a proline went and a
proline where a lysine went, and
that in polypeptides is two
amino acids different where beef
is 3 amino acids different from
human and two from pork!)
DIF needs YOUR help
to cover the Australian scene
down under. Please Email me at mailto:mhunt206@comcast.net.
Thank you.
