![]() "Valiumania," as a 1976 piece authored by Cant in the New York Times Magazine was titled, termed it the most profitable drug in history, and questioned whether it had been "overmarketed" by Hoffman-LaRoche. ![]() "Probably it would be very hard to find any group of middle-class women in which some aren't regularly on Valium," Nyswander declared. Marie Nyswander, a New York City psychiatrist, who warned of its addictive properties. The following year, a Vogue article entitled "Danger Ahead! Valium-The Pill You Love Can Turn on You," quoted extensively from Dr. Part of Valium's appeal lay in the belief that it was nonaddictive, and unlike other tranquilizers, almost impossible to be taken in a lethal dose by a suicidal person.īy 1974, 59.3 million Valium prescriptions were being written by doctors, and this figure, taken in conjunction with Hoffman-LaRoche's patent on diazepam, meant that Sternbach's employer had cornered 81 percent of the tranquilizer market in the country. Users were cautioned not to operate heavy machinery or drive a car while taking it, and warnings about mixing it with alcohol were also blatant-the effects of both substances on the central nervous system were doubled when ingested together. "Some Roche executives did not expect much of it," wrote Gilbert Cant of the New York Times Magazine about Sternbach's synthesizing of diazepam, "but a couple of them tried it on postmenopausal mothers-in-law whom they found insufferable, and were delighted by its calming effects." Valium came on the market in the United States in 1963. Because it was so potent, it could be formulated into much smaller doses than Librium, and unlike other tranquilizers, soothed without inducing drowsiness. All of these new drugs were targeted at middle-class Americans, many of whom were unlikely to visit a psychologist or psychiatrist for non-threatening depression or anxiety disorders because of the stigma attached to "mental illness." Valium, stronger than Librium and less bitter in taste, acted on the limbic system, the part of the brain that regulates emotional response and reaction. Librium had been developed to compete with a rival company's popular tranquilizer, Miltown. Leo Sternbach, who had also synthesized the compound that came on the market as Librium in 1960. Valium, taken from the Latin word meaning "to be strong and well" and classified as an anxiolytic, or anxiety-dissolving drug, was developed in the New Jersey labs of pharmaceutical giant Hoffman-LaRoche by Dr. Reports found that many prescriptions for diazepam, Valium's generic name, were written by general practitioners, not mental-health professionals, and that a disproportionate number were given to women over 30 to control so-called "free-floating" anxiety. Little over a decade after its 1963 debut on the prescription-drug market in the United States, Valium had become a widely prescribed tranquilizer and began attracting media attention for what was seen as its rampant abuse.
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