Call for drug restrictions

By KATHERINE HOBY

An alarming increase in the number of overdose patients has brought calls for restrictions on common medicines such as paracetamol.

Dr Bernard Foley of Auckland Hospital's emergency department said doctors around the country had noticed a rise in the number of people overdosing on pills they had bought by the packet from supermarkets or pharmacies.

He suggested restrictions on the dispensing and sale of Paracetamol and antihistamines would reduce the numbers using over-the-counter medicines as a "cry-for-help" overdose method.

"Perhaps some of these things should go back to prescription-only to make them a bit harder to access," he said. "The debate should be opened up at least."

SmithKline Beecham (NZ), which distributes the Panadol brand of Paracetamol, said the poisoning numbers were of concern.

However, director Stephen Walker said any new data had to be weighed up in relation to existing information, including consumer rights. "Having said that, we always look at new information with interest."

Dr Foley also cited the case of Good Night, which was marketed as an over-the-counter sleeping pill in 1995.

He said advertising of the drug saw an "epidemic" of 30 overdoses within six months.

But the distributor of Good Night said the drug could not have been involved in any recent increase in overdoses because it had only just returned to pharmacy shelves.

Aventis Pharma spokesman Steve Roberts said the drug had been unavailable for the past two years for reasons unrelated to the poisoning figures, and packet sizes had been reduced from 25 to 10.

The chairman of the Ministry of Health's medicines classification committee, Stewart Jessamine, said he was unaware of any ongoing problems with antihistamines or Paracetamol.