A fifty-year-old woman living in Japan is infected with a potentially fatal virus, hepatitis C. Doctors bombard her body with a powerful drug to boost her immune response. The drug beats back the virus, but has horrific side effects. She becomes inexplicably moody, rapidly sinking into a depression so savage that the woman douses herself in oil and sets herself alight. Fortunately, her suicide attempt fails and she recovers fully. But the woman's terrifying experience is not unique. Over the past few years, there's been a steady trickle of bizarre reports of people becoming suicidal after taking alpha interferon and interleukin-2, two popular immune-boosting drugs. Hundreds of others have become seriously depressed.
展开▼
