@geekgrrl77: I agree - but a lot of my female friends who are Chinese are very concerned about their lashes, particularly for special events like weddings (I'm of European ancestry). The amount of time they spend talking about false eyelashes astonishes me. One has also gotten the eyelid surgery and a few others are considering it.

I think Asian women are the target demographic for this drug, when used for eyelash purposes.

@Rectilinear Propagation: It's probably just because man was made in god's image, thus we are the perfect specimen.

(Nevermind the beer guts, balding heads, 13 year old behavior, or constant gas)

The other problem is that doctors will insist that your problem doesn't exist until they figure out how to treat it. If you have an new illness you better hope there's a physical symptom like a growth or your eyes changing color. If all you can describe are symptoms that aren't visible (like pain) then it's all in your head.

@ZoeSchizzel: Not just joint pain. It also means that if you hurt yourself anywhere the pain will increase and spread from the site of impact instead of just gradually lessening on it's own. That means if you bump your arm into a table your entire arm will end up being sore if try to wait for the original hurt to go away on its own.

@HogwartsAlum: People pay big money for the ones with green eyes. Lord knows David Lo-Pan always wants one.

@god_forbids: I'm not sure anyone who doesn't have glaucoma actually has a need for it.

I'm tired of pharmaceutical companies making up "diseases" so that they can sell products for it. I never heard of "restless leg syndrome" until there was a drug to prevent it.

also, the lashes are about the same length before and after.

This product has horrible side effects. People who use it for actual medical conditions even hate the side effects. If some woman wants to use this b/c her eyelashes aren't "perfect" maybe she deserves hair growing under her eyes and her blue eyes turning brown.

@Daveinva: Well "Chronic Fatigue Syndrome" means that you've been to every doctor in town and no one can tell you why you are so tired you can't physically lift your head, even after a full night's sleep, and why your brain feels foggy and you genuinely can't remember if you fed the dogs or ate breakfast yourself, when only a month ago you passed the bar exam. "Fibromyalgia" means that you've got this horrible joint pain, and everything in your system feels swollen and achy, but -- again -- every doctor you've seen can't figure out why you're in so much chronic pain so they give you mild painkillers and a fibromyalgia diagnosis. I have friends with both. Each of them are INCREDIBLY productive, physically active intelligent women who are (at times) crippled by these illnesses. It's bizarre because if it was ME who had either illness, I'd pooh-pooh the symptoms because even though I'm naturally slim and apparently productive, I'm kinda lazy and low-energy on my best days and if you ever see me break a sweat I hope you call an ambulance because I'm having a heart attack -- but these women are WOW!!! Knowing them put both illnesses in perspective to me as very real, painful burdens that they shoulder and bravely live with and fight as their quality of life diminishes.

On the other hand -- no eyelashes means....er...no eyelashes? I mean, we'd all like long thick eyelashes. I'd like my legs to be six inches longer. But it's not painful or debilitating having legs that are a mere foot long (visually). Not much anyway.

The FDA actually has a really thorough system in place, the problem is money will always win out over ethics so, in practice the system loses a lot of its stringency. At least trial results have to be made public upon approval.

@sixseeds: Yup. Lutisse=Bimatoprost Ophthalmic =Lumigan

[www.flickr.com]

If someone wants to take this, or anything else, and it doesn't hurt anyone else, than they shouldn't need anyone's permission to do so. Is risking eye color change that terrible a risk that people-- adults, like your or I-- should be prevented from making an informed decision? Have you SEEN what breast augmentation surgery looks like? Trust me, this is small beer in the pantheon of irrelevant cosmetic choices in comparison.

As for the sadly typical Consumerist comentariat venom directed towards any company that dares to make a profit, Allergan figured out a beneficial side effect for a drug they already had. Yes, the benefit is ludicrous, and in the storied halls of medical conditions, losing your eyelashes is the smallest of concerns. But again, it's stuff like this that pays for stuff we need. Or do folks think "Big Pharma" makes tons of money on glaucoma medication? Those R&D dollars have to come from somewhere-- why not from vain women?

BTW, in the interest of full disclosure, my GF uses this stuff (it works, incredibly, bizarrely). Do I make fun of her using it? Yes, I do, very much so. *I* think it's ridiculous, but again, she's an adult-- an RN with a Master's, in fact. She understands the risks, she weighed them, she takes this, and she likes it.

C'mon, folks-- this isn't fraud, it's not criminal, it's not evil.

Now, if only someone can explain to me what the difference between "Chronic Fatigue Syndrome" and "Fibromyalgia" is, THEN we can talk about invented diseases requiring expensive-yet-needless pharmaceutical intervention...

;-)

That said, I like my deep brown eyes that turn black when I'm angry (or so I'm told). Maybe that's why when I lose my temper people do this:

:O

@sixseeds: Fortunately, Pfizer has a new drug for you. Taking Confidy once a week will allow you to have unshakable faith in big pharma. It's only intended for people diagnosed with hypercynicism though.

Latisse is a lower concentration of the Glaucoma medication Lumigan(made by Allergan). Lumigan side effects are basically eye lash growth, darker color iris (for example a browner pigmentation of the iris), also darker pigmentation of the skin around the eyes, and also redness of the eye. Lumigan is instilled directly into the eyes. Latisse is applied differently.

Latisse is only applied to the top lid eyelashes. Should never come into contact with the eyeball at all. This would prevent eye color change and should only promote eyelash growth.

Pharmaceutical companies pump a lot of money into R&D so selling one product that has many different useful is golden.

But yeah, I hate when I see the abuse of a medication just for purely cosmetic reason.

People might be willing to tolerate the low effectiveness and high dangerous side effects if it was for a hard to treat disabling or life threatening condition. Many of these drugs are for trivial issues.

@admiral_stabbin: I'm a woman, and I couldn't agree with you more.

Of course, most of those individuals will consider an eyelash implant instead - [hubpages.com] - at 3 grand, I can't imagine that you wouldn't hit the payout for Latisse at some point. And insurance would probably pick up the tab for the surgery before Latisse if it were medically necessary.

@geekgrrl77: I always thought her problem was the 'brows

@sixseeds: Sadly, I found out a surgeon I once saw for legitimate (not cosmetic) purposes prescribes Latisse!

The horror! (He does great work, otherwise.)

All Brooke needs to do now is actually develop glaucoma. Maybe in a few decades...

/ Wouldn't wish it upon anyone.

I'm sure there are some people who could really benefit from this, but I don't think Brooke Shields is one of them. She benefits from the money, though, even if the commercial is silly and patronizing. It's like if she was promoting postpartum depression awareness by showing a bunch of well-lit and snappily dressed people tossing a baby around like a hot potato, until one sad woman throws it out the window.

OK, maybe not. But this just blows my mind that advertisers can get away with this.

Yeah, gotta say.... I was so completely on Brooke Shields' side after the jerk Tom Cruise made of himself. But I think it's at the least irresponsible, and possibly unethical, for Brooke Shields to be hawking a medication for glaucoma for beauty purposes. And not just any beauty purpose, but a fairly frivolous one.

Hopefully doctors are laughing off anyone who comes to them with a request for this drug.

And it's not just the beauty salon aspect, although that bothers me (if you must do this, just stick with mascara, ye gods!). These companies blur the line between really helpful, necessary drugs and unhelpful or unnecessary/ineffective drugs and there seems to be very little enforcement regarding information, testing, etc.

Does the FDA even have any rules regarding medical usefulness? This seems purely cosmetic. Did it get approved based on some super rare condition where people lose all their eyelashes but is being marketed as a cosmetic drug?

I went a "girls night out" event promoting the product with special guest Brooke Shields about a month ago. Don't hate, I only wanted to meet Brooke and had no interest in the product : ) The turnout was astonishing. The auditorium was packed with women who were so excited about the product, that everytime the guests said something great about it, the women would cheer as if the Red Sox had won the world series. Amazing.