Public Citizen takes FDA to court over use of benzocaine in OTC products

22 September 2017

American advocacy group Public Citizen is launching a legal bid to force a ruling on a petition it launched three years ago regarding the use of benzocaine in over-the-counter medicines.

Research stretching back decades has indicated a link between the use of the analgesic and a rare, sometimes fatal condition called methemoglobinemia, in which the amount of oxygen carried through the blood stream is greatly reduced.

The local anesthetic is commonly used in gels to alleviate the symptoms of teething in infants, and can be found in products as Pfizer’s (NYSE: PFE) Anbesol and Church & Dwight’s (NYSE: CHD) Orajel.

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