Aspirin a Day Dangerous

The November 11, 2000 issue of the British Medical Journal finds that even small doses of aspirin every day can cause such serious damage to the body that patients need to reconsider very closely the trade-off between the possible benefits and the likely damage.

According to the study, in which doctors reviewed 24 different studies involving almost 66,000 patients, people over 50 who take the drug daily almost double their chances of developing ulcers and internal bleeding which can lead to death.

The researchers found that "no evidence exists that reducing the dose or using modified release formulations would reduce the incidence of gastrointestinal hemorrhage."