Text from the examiner.com:
http://www.examiner.com/article/ice-agent-ravaged-by-propecia-striiped-of-badge-holds-merck-ceo-responsible
http://www.examiner.com/article/ice-agent-ravaged-by-propecia-striiped-of-badge-holds-merck-ceo-responsible
If not for Propecia, Steven Rossello would still be playing a critical role in protecting America against terrorism.
In June 2010, six months after earning special-agent status at the Immigration and Customs Enforcement division of the Department of Homeland Security, he was dispatched to Harlingen, Texas. Armed with a SIG Sauer pistol, M4 rifle and top-secret federal clearance, he spent most nights patrolling the Mexican border.
Among his targets were al-Qaeda operatives being smuggled into the U.S. by Latin drug cartels. Stopping these shadowy figures made for fewer threats to the safety and freedom of Americans from Harlingen to Houlton, Maine. It was a job Rossello took pride in, excelled in, and planned on doing for at least the next two decades.
But today the 29-year-old New York City native sits in a cubicle at the ICE office, stripped of his special-agent title, his badge, and his firearms. His duties have been reduced to running computer checks on suspects and completing paperwork for other agents—while earning $15,000 less per year than he did as a criminal investigator.
Rossello's transformation from a healthy, happy, outgoing young man on the verge of a six-figure income to one whose life was turned upside down by Propecia can be traced back to 2006, when he was completing his bachelor's degree in international politics and business at the State University of New York-Albany.
"I first took Propecia in college, at 22," he tells The Examiner of Merck & Co.'s popular hair-loss medication (generic name finasteride). "But I stopped after using it off and on for three months because I couldn't afford it. And I got hit with anxiety and insomnia, which also played a role in my decision to quit.