Diabetes Drug May Be Linked to Heart Failure

Consumer advocates contended Tuesday that the diabetes drug Rezulin, already notorious for destroying some patients’ livers, also may be linked to 56 cases of heart failure.

Also, diabetics need warning that two similar medicines touted as better alternatives to Rezulin have not been proved safer, the consumer group Public Citizen concluded after analyzing government documents.

Public Citizen urged that the Food and Drug Administration ban Rezulin and put stronger warning labels on the competing drugs Avandia and Actos.

Rezulin was widely cheered when it hit the market in 1997 as the first medicine that promised to resensitize the body to insulin. But Rezulin’s liver toxicity quickly surfaced.

The FDA knows of 85 cases of liver failure linked to Rezulin.

Carol Goodrich, spokeswoman for manufacturer Warner-Lambert Co., said FDA officials, in a private meeting last week, “reaffirmed the benefits [of Rezulin] outweigh its risks,” and its competitors have risks too.