Pregnant Women Beware Now

According to researchers, pregnant women who take antidepressants such as Prozac (ironically also referred to as the "happy pill"), increase the risk of birth defects in their babies by more than half. Even more alarming, women using SSRIs in the first 12 weeks of pregnancy - when many may be unaware they are expecting - were at a 40 per cent greater risk of their baby suffering malformation. The risk of heart defects was 60 per cent higher. The study, by researchers in the U.S. and Denmark, compared 1,054 women who took SSRIs during the first three months of pregnancy with 150,000 who were not prescribed them.

The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approved Prozac in 1998 and it fast became the most widely prescribed drug for depression on the market. Alarmingly, two years previous to the FDA approval, a 1996 study published in the New England Journal of Medicine found that women taking Prozac during pregnancy were twice as likely to deliver a baby with three or more "minor abnormalities" and poorer than average neonatal adaptation.

Almost a decade later, in 2005, a Danish study indicated that pregnant women who take SSRI antidepressant medicines in early pregnancy may have an increased risk of giving birth to an infant with heart problems. In this study, infants exposed to SSRI antidepressants during the first 3 months of pregnancy had a 60% higher chance of having developing a heart problem compared with infants whose mothers did not take SSRI antidepressants.

In 2004, Health Canada advised of potential adverse effects of SSRIs and other anti-depressants on newborns, including fluoxetine [Prozac]. The advisory was intended to increase awareness among mothers and physicians of the possible symptoms that may occur in the newborn, so that symptoms could be recognized and addressed immediately.

In May 2005, researchers from the University of Pittsburgh, estimated in the Journal of American Medical Association, that in any given year at least 80,000 pregnant women in the U.S. are prescribed SSRIs, and Prozac is the biggest seller.

If your baby was born with heart birth defects and you took Prozac during your pregnancy, a lawyer may be able to help you. Please send your details to an attorney by clicking the link below for a free case evaluation.