D.E.S.: The Bitter Pill

by Robert Meyers ‧ RELEASE DATE: Oct. 5, 1983

The unthinking development and tragic use of diethylstilbesterol from 1941 to 1971--without the freshness, clarity, or applicability of DES: The Complete Story (1981), by Cynthia Orenberg, a medical writer and a victim. Meyers (Like Normal People) begins with the drug's synthesis in England, and follows its popularization and marketing, there and in the US, as a treatment for threatened miscarriage--to the point that it was prescribed for women with no symptoms or history of miscarriage. (Some of those treated, in fact, were pregnant for the first time.) The beginning of the end came in 1971 with the first published report linking DES to cancer in the female offspring of women who had taken the drug. The frenetic outcome included lawsuits by patients, FDA foot-dragging, and catastrophic medical treatment--elements which Meyers is unable either to disentangle or weave together coherently. In his view, this twisted tale ""is preeminently a story of people--the women who took it"" and their families; all the other aspects--political, economic, medical--are ""really elements that enter the funnel of American health care and come out on the doorsteps of American consumers."" And, rather than give the doctors' role a hard going-over, Meyers takes a few tired pot-shots. (When a physician-interviewee puts on a white coat: ""what was there about wearing that white coat? Did he speak better wearing the coat? With more authority?"") For rigor as well as personal involvement, Orenberg is far superior.

Pub Date: Oct. 5, 1983

ISBN: N/A

Page Count: -

Publisher: Seaview/Putnam

Review Posted Online: N/A

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 1, 1983

Categories: NONFICTION