Date: 10/03/99
By JULIE ROBOTHAM, Medical Writer, and agencies
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"Pork" insulin was withdrawn in 1990, though the firm makes it available to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has almost completely superseded insulins derived from pigs or cows.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.
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