Chantix, the New Stop Smoking Drug is Raising a Cause for Concern

Chantix the new stop smoking drug released by Pfizer last year is causing great concern. Psychotic and suicidal behavior appear to be side effects when combined with alcohol. The FDA is now going to be looking into these allegations to see if the Chantix drug is the cause.

My son-in-law started taking Chantix at the beginning of August 2007 to quit smoking and has experienced very similar side effects. He chose this drug because some of his coworkers were taking it and having tremendous success. They had experienced some of the uncomfortable side effects that were detailed on the prescription labeling. None had reported experiencing what my son-in-law was going through.

Since starting on Chantix he started to have terrible nightmares. This was uncommon because normally he was a very sound sleeper with no nightmares present. In fact most of the time, he could not even recall what his dreams were.

His mood also changed from being a normally quite, easy go lightly kind of guy, to a very ornery and ugly individual. I should say that he also drank alcohol while on this medication, but not excessively. He would however have a few drinks socially.

He never spoke of having any extreme rage or hallucinations, but it was evident he was experiencing rage that he had never displayed before. It got bad so quickly that my daughter threatened to move to the basement.

It wasn't until the news of people having these kinds of reactions that they were able to put two and two together. Since then my son-in-law has stopped taking the Chantix drug. Unfortunately the mood swing has not totally gone away, but it has only been a couple of weeks since he last took the drug.

As of today, if you go to Chantix.com there still is no warning in regards to the change in mood behaviors or not mixing alcohol while on this drug. If the FDA takes it serious enough to make an investigation, shouldn't Chantix or better yet Pfizer make some type of disclaimer as to the potential side effects created when mixing alcohol with this drug? There are also no mentions of the severe depressions or suicidal tendencies that quite often occur.

Isn't it the responsibly of Pfizer the maker of Chantix to disclose not only the common side effects, but also the not so common side effects and hazards? Even if only a handful of people have these extreme reactions the public should have full informed knowledge before taking any drug.