Cold Meds Send 7,000 Kids To ERs Each Year

First National Estimate Of Problem Says Two-Thirds Of Children Took Medicines Unsupervised

(CBS/AP)  Cough and cold medicines send about 7,000 children to hospital emergency rooms each year, the U.S. government said Monday in its first national estimate of the problem.

About two-thirds of the cases were children who took the medicines unsupervised. However, about one-quarter involved cases in which parents gave the proper dosage and an allergic reaction or some other problem developed, the study by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reported.

The study included both over-the-counter and prescription medicines. It comes less than two weeks after the U.S. Food and Drug Administration warned parents that over-the-counter cough and cold medicines are too dangerous for children younger than 2.

The news may increase the pressure to extend that ban to kids under the age of 6, especially because there's no evidence these medicines actually help them, reports CBS News medical correspondent Dr. Jon LaPook.

CDC researchers gathered case reports of children 11 and under who had taken cough and cold medications and wound up in 63 hospitals studied in 2004 and 2005. They used that number to come up with the national estimate.

About 1,600 of the estimated 7,100 children are under 2, so the FDA's guidance - if followed - should reduce such ER cases by 23 percent.

Nearly two-thirds of the cases involved kids ages 2 to 5, the CDC found.

"The main message is no medication left in the hands of a 3-year-old is safe," said the CDC's Dr. Melissa Schaefer.

Many of the ER case reports were not specific about symptoms, and the researchers did not follow cases through to conclusion. So they did not know if - or how many - deaths resulted, said Schaefer, an epidemiologist who was the study's lead author.

For the children whose symptoms were reported, allergic reactions like hives and itching were most common, and neurological symptoms like drowsiness and unsteady walking were next, she said.

Most of the medicines involved were liquid combinations of cough and cold treatments, CDC researchers said.

Of the children who reportedly got the right dose of medication, about a third were younger than 2, but more than half were ages 6 to 11, the study found.

Some children suffer side effects from medications, so those results aren't necessarily unexpected, Schaefer said. The FDA will have to balance data like this against the medicines' benefits and other factors, she added.

"What we gave them was a piece of the puzzle," she said.

The CDC recommends parents stop telling children these medicines taste good, reports LaPook. The agency is also calling for more secure packaging.

Some parents have already been skeptical of strong medicines on young children.

"You worry about the effects of any medications on such a little person, little body when there are so many unknowns about how medications actually effects them," said mother Erin Roy.

The study tells a story of the misuse of medications, said Linda Suydam, president of the Consumer Healthcare Products Association, a trade group that represents manufacturers and distributors of over-the-counter medicines.

"These medicines are safe when used as directed, and this government review underscores the importance of educating consumers - especially those with small children - on the safe use and safekeeping of medicine," Suydam said, in a prepared statement.

The study was published online Monday. It will appear in the April issue of Pediatrics, a journal of the American Academy of Pediatrics.

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[jennmarie620]

Um ... banning over-the-counter cough and cold medicines for children under 6 years of age will NOT stop children of taking the medicine unsupervised. (Hence, the unsupervised part.) And no, children taking medicine on their own does not mean they have bad parents. In 1984, when I was two years old, I climbed up into the cabinet where my parents kept the medicine (using drawers as stairs) and drank an entire bottle of cough medicine. My mother called Poison Control who instructed her to give me another bottle - which caused me to be physically sick and throw it all up. What has changed so much in twenty years that we''re so overly sensitive to things that have been happening for decades?

The kicker? If I were to say that I give my child a cup of tea with a spoonful of whiskey and honey when she''s sick, I''d be arrested for child abuse - and yet that is a remedy that was used for over a hundred years for illness! (And whiskey works much better on coughs and chest colds than any OTC medicine or antibiotic.)

As for allergic reactions to OTC and prescription medicines - nothing is going to stop that except not taking medications at all! No one knows if they''re allergic to something until they are exposed to it first. The FDA is becoming a joke and is just one more example of how the American government has changed so drastically from what it is supposed to be.

[fstop100]

what happened to the FDA or should i say who runs the FDA?