According to an American study relayed by the British medical journal, certain antidepressants called selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors (SSRIs) may increase the risk of birth defects when women take them during pregnancy.
Among these antidepressants, it is especially fluoxetine (Prozac) and paroxetine (Deroxat, Divarius, Paxil) which are singled out by the American Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).
For this study, CDC researchers asked nearly 28,000 women if they had taken any of the 5 most commonly prescribed antidepressants (Celexa, Lexapro, Prozac, Paxil, or Zoloft) in a period of one month before conception until the 3rd month of pregnancy. They then analyzed the records of women whose children were born with a birth defect and found that three antidepressants (Celexa, Lexapro and Zoloft) were in no way associated with cases of malformations while Prozac and Deroxat were linked to a increased risk of birth defects. Women who take these two drugs during pregnancy are said to be between 2 and 3.5 times more likely to have fetal malformations than those who do not.
Among the cases studied, Prozac was associated with a case of deformity of the skull. Deroxat has been associated with one case of anencephaly (a partial absence of the brain) and one case of bowel protrusion outside the body. The two antidepressants have also been implicated in cases heart defects.
As the researchers point out, their analysis shows that there is a link between the abnormalities in the fetus and the taking of drugs, but it cannot prove that these are the drugs that caused this malformation.
Other previous studies had already shown that antidepressants triple the risk of having an autistic child and that they are bad for the baby’s heart.
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