A campaign to educate all world travelers about Mefloquine neurotoxicity.
Our MISSION is to provide information to, and encourage the formal establishment of basic health care provisions for, individuals injured by mefloquine.
What is mefloquine?
According to Canada.com/Health mefloquine belongs to the class of medications called antimalarials. Canada’s experience with mefloquine (also known as Lariam), dates back to the Canadian Armed Forces 1992 peacekeeping mission in Somalia. By the mid 1990’s, the devastating effects of mefloquine on Canadian soldiers were already being reported, and they are still being reported today.
SYMPTOMS OF MEFLOQUINE NEUROTOXICITY
Acute Side Effects, Adverse Reactions to Mefloquine
The article, Psychiatric Side Effects of Mefloquine: Applications to Forensic Psychiatry, (Ritchie, Block, Nevin), J Am Acad Psychiatry Law 41(2) :224-35, 2013, introduces mefloquine as “an antimalarial medication with potent psychotropic potential. Severe psychiatric side effects due to mefloquine intoxication are well documented, including anxiety, panic attacks, paranoia, persecutory delusions, dissociative psychosis, and anterograde amnesia.”
Chronic, Permanent or Long-term Reactions to Mefloquine
European and US product labeling for mefloquine now warn of a risk of permanent and irreversible neurological sequelae including vertigo, loss of balance and symptoms of polyneuropathy. The newly described permanent nature of certain of these neurological effects challenges the conventional belief that they are due merely to the long half-life of mefloquine and its continued presence in the body, and raises new considerations for the rational use of the drug against parasitic disease.
From Idiosyncratic quinolone central nervous system toxicity:Historical insights into the chronic neurological sequelae of mefloquine (Remington L. Nevin), Int J Parasitol Drugs and Drug Resistance: 4 Issue 2, August 2014, 118-125.
a chronology of mefloquine media in canada
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Research & CLINICAL EXPERTS
Dr. Remington Nevin
Dr. Remington Lee Nevin is an expert consultant in the adverse effects of antimalarial drugs particularly the neurotoxic quinoline derivative mefloquine (previously marketed in the United States as Lariam®).
Dr. Elspeth Cameron Ritchie
Dr. Ritchie is a forensic psychiatrist with expertise in military and veterans' issues.
Dr. Greg Passey
Dr. Greg Passey specializes in treating first responders who suffer from post-traumatic stress disorder.