According to a BBC report http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/health/7917188.stm , the lack of effectiveness and safety of 36 medicines has shown that they should no longer be sold for children under the age of six. It goes on to report that according to the Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency (MHRA) children’s medicines were being reviewed owing to a ‘change of thinking’. Many years ago it was thought that we could use adult doses in a watered down way but we now know that children’s bodies are different.
Professor Peter Helms, a child health specialist at Aberdeen University, said “Babies are not little adults – for a start they are about 80% water, compared to 70% in adults, and their internal organs are not as mature and may find it harder to detoxify.”
Dr June Raine from the MHRA said over-the-counter medicines had been used to treat colds for years but when they first emerged, the clinical trials were not required to demonstrate that they worked in children.
I find it shocking that over a prolonged period of time over the counter drugs have been marketed in the media and sold in chemists and shops, as effective and safe for children without clinical trials to assess their safety and effectiveness! It seems that the particular cold remedies highlighted in this report have not been proved to be effective and the toxic effect on children has not been measured.
I wonder what bought about the ‘change of thinking’? Well, it does coincide with the new clinical trials testing for childrens medicines by the World Health Organisation (WHO), funded by the Gates foundation for antibiotics and rehydration for children in the developing world, and correcting the dosage for pediatric medicines.
Whilst I agree with the use of childrens medication in serious illness, and life threatening disease, I think that dosing children with drugs should not be the first thing that parents or doctors do. Parents need to give their children good food, hydration, sunshine, play and love in the right doses, and view advertising with a discerning eye, when it comes to medications for coughs, colds and sniffles and the like.
you tell them