Federal US Agent reveals the problems he developed after taking Propecia

Text from the examiner.com:
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.

"A few weeks after coming off the drug, I developed some sexual side effects, but didn't attribute them to Propecia."

Because the mental side effects resolved themselves relatively quickly after stopping the medication, Rossello believed that whatever side effects occurred in the future would also go away—as Merck promised on its labeling. That assumption will haunt him the rest of his days.

Meanwhile, his sexual issues persisted for years, but he still didn't attribute them to Propecia. "Back then, there was little, if any, information out there on the subject," he says, "so I thought it was a natural change in my body. Or maybe just stress."

In September 2010, Rossello went back on the drug. But after three months, not only did his original side effects return with a vengeance, a host of others sprung up alongside them. So he quit finasteride after three months, only to find his condition worsening.

Now, 18 months after tossing his prescription bottles in the trash, he says he still counts these among his side effects: genital pain and numbness; testicular shrinkage; loss of libido; sexual dysfunction; reduced fertility; liver pain; and bloating. These symptoms are known in clinical terms as post-finasteride syndrome (PFS).

"For 14 months after I stopped taking the drug, I felt depressed," says Rossello (whose medical records were reviewed by The Examiner). "2011 was a nightmare."

During that period, he consulted with one GP, one urologist, three endocrinologists and three psychiatrists, none of whom, he says, could help him.

Adding insult to injury, Dr. Dale Tidaback, the occupational health chief at the Department of Homeland Security, wrote in one medical report dated April 26, 2012: "We have no evidence for Mr. Rossello's claim that his severe depression is the result of finasteride (Propecia). Further, it is more likely than not that it is not due to finasteride."

Yet Rossello says he has since been vindicated by a study published that same month in the Journal of Clinical Psychiatry, showing that 36 percent of the 61 young, previously healthy Propecia patients examined by Dr. Michael Irwig of George Washington University had symptoms of severe depression for at least three months after quitting the drug, while nearly 44 percent reported suicidal thoughts.

What's more, in April 2011—a full year earlier—Abdulmaged Traish, a professor of biochemistry and urology at Boston University School of Medicine, had published a study in the Journal of Sexual Medicine linking Propecia to depression in patients who had stopped taking the drug.

It was also during this period that the fed's career began to unravel.

In August 2011, just as Rossello’s depression was beginning to fade, a supervisor told him he had two choices: resign from ICE or admit yourself to a psychiatric ward for evaluation.

Rossello chose the latter, and was immediately forced to surrender his badge and gun, despite no breaches of conduct or policy.

After 11 months of unemployment, five of which were unpaid medical leave, he was allowed to return from work, due to his depression fully subsiding. But he had been demoted to intelligence assistant, which might be better described as a desk jockey with light duties.

"Before Propecia brought my life to a screeching halt, I had great professional aspirations," says Rossello. "Now I'm earning half of what I would have been making as a special agent in the next two years, with limited potential for advancement."

And like many PFS patients, Rossello's love life has been decimated.

Shortly after moving to Harlingen, he began dating women in the area, but he says his finasteride side effects made it impossible to sustain those romances for more than a few weeks.

In September 2011, however, he found some solace in a relationship with a fellow crime-fighter that would last 10 months. But she, too, then left him, unable to cope with his sexual side effects, and work-related stress brought on by PFS.

While Rossello says his career has been damaged beyond repair, he is keeping close tabs on medical research seeking to identify the root causes of PFS, which he hopes will lead to a cure in the coming years.

But such research is in its infancy, and the handful of doctors and scientists who are investigating this growing epidemic are doing so on their own time, with zero funding.

"What I can't fathom is why Merck itself isn't stepping up to the plate," he says. "From the growing number of Propecia patients reporting their persistent side effects to the FDA, it seems obvious that the drug is at fault.

"I'm a firm believer that the fish rots from the head down, so I can't help but blame Merck CEO Kenneth Frazier for my condition. And I think the thousands of other PFS suffers around the globe—along with their friends and loved ones—will agree with what I'm asking him to do."

Rossello's plea to Frazier, he tells The Examiner, is this:

(1) Pull Propecia off the market immediately and recall all existing prescriptions.

(2) Publicly apologize for not doing so sooner.

(3) Compensate PFS victims for medical expenses and loss of wages related to their condition.

(4) Fund research into a cure for PFS through an independent board of medical professionals.

"Until that happens," says Rossello, "I'll do whatever it takes to warn the public of Propecia's extreme dangers."