Accutane Spells Trouble

Acne Medication Made Me Shoot the Sheriff

I hope you dislike acne more than you dislike fatal crashes.Something Awful has a proud tradition of covering breaking news, our staff of diligent writers and dangerous sociopaths works overtime to bring you the latest links to CNN that are a week old and then comment on them sarcastically. Speaking of which, DID YOU HEAR ABOUT THAT KID WHO JUST CRASHED INTO A BANK?! Oh my god, wet off the presses.

It seems this juvenile go-getter decided to commandeer a Cessna and execute a perfect landing into the side of the Bank of America building in Tampa. My initial reaction was that he got his inspiration to do this from listening to Credence Clearwater Revival and playing Microsoft Flight Simulator, but it turns out something far more insidious might have been behind his actions: ACNE MEDICATION. For years mankind has been plagued by people going crazy because of acne medication and crashing something into something bigger and making people die. The government doesn't want you to know this, and it's too hot for even those videos that are too hot for TV, so you might not have heard about it.

To prove my journalistic integrity I am going to explode the lid off this incredible scandal and let you all in on the truth behind Accutane. Somehow I survived puberty without ever requiring prescription acne medication, so I don't have any first hand experience, but what I've turned up will blow your socks so far off that they will fly all the way around the earth and hit you in the back and then blow off socks that you put on while they were flying around the earth.

Accutane (isotretinoin) Fact Sheet

Manufacturer: Some company related to Japanese tests conducted on American POWs during the Second World War.

Contents: Primarily isotretinoin, which is Latin for "refined physical hatred and self-loathing". Other contents may include killer bee extract, PCP, shattered dreams, the distilled facial expressions of Donald Rumsfeld, pineal gland squeezings, and x-rays taken of a beaten dog.

Warnings: May cause mild depression. It should be noted that in the dictionary "depression" - especially when linked with the word "mild" - does not mean "may cause you to crash an airplane into the side of a bank building". The FDA is examining these guidelines.

Lab Results: I've poured over several interesting lab test results from a number of internal and FDA sources and I present the two most intriguing here without editing.

Matsumara & Face Stabs Inc. Internal Report on the Effects of Accutane (dated 02-06-1996)
From: Dr. H. Chen
To: Committee of Supreme Happy Fun Drug ReleasesSo much hate in such a little pill.Greetings honorable elders, I have grave news to report in our recent clinical test trials of isotretinoin on upper primates. Many of these cases had optimal results in the reduction of artificially induced facial acne, but a handful reacted with disturbing mental problems and violence. Subject 444-46C, a male gorilla, was exposed to triple dosages of isotretinoin over an application period of 8 days. On the eighth day 46C was placed into the behavior chamber where it brutally mauled the test dummy. It then somehow began to break through a reinforced concrete wall and escape to the top of the construction underway in the West Wing. From its perch high atop the girders it repeatedly hurled large barrels down at a maintenance man who was attempting to rescue one of my lab assistants that the test subject had assaulted.

Repeated attempts by the maintenance man met with near catastrophic failure, even after he had been outfitted with a lightweight sledge hammer. Further problems developed when the barrels reached the bottom and rolled into a vat of Accutane. The barrels were somehow animated by the drug and would emerge seemingly possessed by a malevolent sentience that pursued the maintenance man from below even as he was leaping carefully over the barrels being hurled at him.

Subject 46C was finally subdued from long range with a series of tranquilizer darts and has been destroyed. Autopsy results pending.

It is my recommendation that further plans to begin large scale production of Accutane and submit it for FDA review should be postponed or even discontinued.

COMMITTEE DECREE: Proceed with development.

FDA Post-Approval Review (dated 09-18-1999)
(This review was believed to have been written by Dr. Waldo Shepherd of the FDA, who is in charge of testing and reviewing dermatological medications).

Accutane was approved for prescription only consumption in 1997 with severe warnings about usage during pregnancy and a general warning that it might cause mild depression. It is my opinion that neither of these warnings delve deeply enough into the problems caused by Accutane. My study of reports from doctors whose patients were prescribed Accutane indicate that these side effects may effect patients much more profoundly than initially believed.

Here are several cases that I believe you might find pertinent:

Todd Oakley started a chain reaction of terror while hopped up on Accutane.
• In 1997 John Houston, age 18 was given 50 mg treatments of Accutane daily. After three weeks of using the drug Houston suffered an apparent psychological breakdown and appeared at school completely naked and attempting to hug passing students. After being expelled from his school he attempted to drive his car into the World Bank Building in New York City. He was severely injured in the accident and the burns on his face made unnecessary the further ingestion of Accutane.
• Later that same year a 16 year old Jennifer Ricardo was administered weekly injections of Accutane for severe facial blemishes. After three injections she attempted to beat a 9 year old crossing guard to death with a hubcap she tore from a passing car. Onlookers subdued her briefly but she managed to free herself and run headlong into the wall of a nearby grade school causing fatal head trauma.
• In August of 1998 a 20 year old (doctor refused to disclose patient's identity) was given a 6 month treatment of low-dosage Accutane. At the end of the 6 months he was brought in for review and admitted to eating 11 cats and ramming a riding mower through a bush.
• In December of 1998 Kyle Lowry (age 15) was treated with Accutane for two weeks before he stole the keys to his mother's minivan and drove it through a nativity scene at a shopping mall. The SUV caught fire but Lowry escaped injury. Fleeing from the wreckage he assaulted a mall security guard and after beating him unconscious with a tennis racket he sodomized him. Kyle Lowry returned home where he attempted to ram his racecar day bed through a wall, accidentally collapsing the wall in on himself and causing debilitating spinal injury.
• 19 year old snow mobile enthusiast and Accutane user Todd Oakley underwent dramatic personality changes after three months on the drug. He was abusive and clinically depressed and repeatedly threatened suicide. Before his last prescription expired Oakley drove his snowmobile into the side of a tanker truck, climbed into the cab of the truck, rammed the truck into a fishing boat, seized control of the fishing boat, and rammed the boat into a truck factory. Several trucks were destroyed, one of which rammed into a remote control car factor which sent dozens of remote controlled cars ramming into horrified onlookers.

It is my recommendation that FDA approval for Accutane be suspended immediately pending further review and more careful clinical trials.

BOOM! Did you feel that? That's what it feels like to have your world rocked. Yes ma'am, things are coming up Accutane and it ain't all fun and games, as you can see from my shadily acquired memos. For those of you out there reading this who happen to be using the drug, I strongly suggest you stop taking that rammy shit right now before you ride your Segway through a roadblock.

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