Did You Know?
More Americans die every year from an adverse reaction to a prescription medication than they do from illegal drug use.
Each year we help thousands of people get their cases settled with experienced legal representation from the top lawyers in the United States. Every year approximately 200,000 Americans die from prescription drug reactions. From 1989-2000 the FDA approved more than 1,035 prescription drugs. Drug companies are paying out record number off settlements for recalled drugs and defective drug side effects.
Drug companies are spending billions of dollars each year advertising that their drugs will make you free from pain, control your cholesterol, control your depression, lower your blood pressure, control your arthritis, and even stop your kids acne.
What they are not telling you is that thousands of Americans are having very bad side effects and are dying from using some of these drugs every day. We know this is true, because we are contacted by people seeking legal help about dangerous drug side effects such as heart attacks, strokes and even death from visitors to our Legal Help Centers.
Manufacturers of these drugs, medications, and medical devices have a duty to consumers to provide products that are reasonably safe when used as intended. A drug's approval by the FDA alone does not allow a manufacturer to avoid liability. If you would like to be sent our "Drug Recall Alerts" by email when any of these drugs are recalled or if a lawsuit has been filed against any of these drug makers please enter your name and email box below.
Dangerous Drug Facts
- More than 50% of the U.S. Population is now using prescription drugs.
- Over $78 billion in prescription and over-the-counter (OTC) drugs are produced each year in the United States .
- Seniors account for 43 cents of every dollar spent in the US on prescription drugs.
- Over $78 billion in prescription and over-the-counter (OTC) drugs are produced each year in the United States .
- Projected cost of prescriptions in U.S. , 2014: $414 billion.
- Five out of six persons 65 and older are taking at least one medication and almost half the elderly take three or more.
- Pharmaceutical companies spend over $2 billion sending doctors to more than 314,000 events every year.
- Drug expenditures have risen at least 15 percent every year since 1998.
- Prescription drug use is rising among people of all ages, and use increases with age.
- Medicare beneficiaries spend, on average, more than $1,000 per year out-of-pocket on prescription drugs.
- Twenty-seven percent of Medicare beneficiaries do not have any prescription drug insurance.
History Drug Facts
- Number of new drugs approved by FDA, 1989-2000: 1,035.
- Adult use of antidepressants almost tripled between 1988-1994 and 1999-2000.
- Percentage increase in prescription of central nervous system drugs to children between 1985 and 1999: 327%
- Total number of prescriptions in U.S. , 2001: 3.1 billion.
- National spending on Prescription Drugs rose 20% each year from 1997 through 2001.
- Percent of persons with at least 1 prescription 26.9 (2002)
- Number of drugs ordered or provided: 1.3 billion (2002).
- Average number of prescriptions per U.S. resident, annually, 2001: 1 in 11.
- Total amount spent to advertise prescription drugs directly to consumers, 2001: $2.7 billion.
- From January 1996 to January 2001 , the prices of the prescription drugs most frequently used by seniors raised nearly twice the rate of inflation.
- Number of Americans , annually, who request and receive a prescription for a specific drug after seeing commercial for it: 8.5 million.
- Amount spent by Merck to advertise anti-arthritis drug Vex, 2001: $161 million.
- Amount spent by Knoll Pharmaceutical to advertise anti-obesity drug Meridia: $65 million.
- Amount spent by GlaxoSmithKline to promote antidepressant Paxil: $91.8 million.
- Amount spent on lobbying by pharmaceutical firms, 1996-2002: $500 million.
- The annual report to Congress showed that health expenditures climbed 9.3 percent in 2002 to $1.6 trillion.
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