"The clear finding is that we are losing ground in terms of drug safety, and that ought to be of great concern," said Moore, who led the study.

Both the FDA and a trade group representing drug makers agreed that the number of reported adverse events had been increasing, but they attributed much of the rise to an increase in voluntary reporting of the events. Studies have estimated that from as little as 3% of adverse events to a maximum of about 33% have been reported to the FDA.

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