Four in five asthma deaths may be due to long acting β agonists

doi:10.1136/bmj.332.7556.1467-a

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Pat Hagan

London

Eighty per cent of deaths related to asthma in the United States may be due to the use of long acting β agonists, indicate the results of a meta-analysis of 19 clinical trials.

The results of the review, published in the Annals of Internal Medicine (2006;144; 901-12), have led to calls for the drugs to be withdrawn from the US market.

“We can show that overall it is statistically significant that, compared with patients taking a placebo, these long acting β agonists kill a lot …