Call for laxative supermarket ban

Charity Beat would like to see measures to stop laxative abuse

Laxatives are sold too easily with no restriction on how much and how often people can buy them, according to leading eating disorder charity Beat.

They are calling for the medicine to be banned from being sold over the counter in supermarkets.

They want all laxatives to be sold only by pharmacists, who are qualified to monitor how often a person comes in to buy them and refer them to a counsellor or eating disorder charity if necessary.

The call comes after a survey the charity did of 1,000 under-25s suffering from either anorexia or bulimia.

They found that 79% were binging on laxatives daily to stay thin.

Emily (not her real name) from Norwich is 18. She's a college student and refers to herself as a relapsed anorexic.

But before that stage she said that at her worst she was taking 40 to 50 laxatives a day. She had bulimia and was purging about five times a day and describes it as "disgusting".

'Worst time of my life'

She said: "It led to a downward spiral of anorexia which led to purging, laxative abuse, exercising, and that was the worst time of my life. Nothing was more important than losing weight."

Emily's laxative abuse stemmed from being bullied when she was younger.

"I had that thought in my mind of, 'I need to lose weight, I'm fat, I'm fat - things would be simpler if I weighed less' and it just went on from there."

Soon after that Emily became fascinated and obsessed with losing weight. She regularly chatted on "pro-ana" and "pro-mia" forums (where anorexia and bulimia are openly discussed) and started reading about people with eating disorders.

It was through reading about a girl who took laxatives that Emily got onto the idea.

She admitted: "I thought, 'They're so easy to get, they're cheap' and so I took 10 laxatives and it was amazing. I weighed less the next day and habit starts."

'Form of punishment'

Emily said she would go to supermarkets and buy boxes and boxes of laxatives at a time.

"You get the most awful stomach cramps in the world," she said.

A high number of bulimia sufferers also use laxatives, a study found

"My parents didn't notice but you develop tactics. You go to such extremes. You can just say, 'I've eaten something dodgy'.

"Using laxatives was a sick form of punishment on myself for being so disgusting and binging that I felt the pain was only a small way to punish myself for being so greedy."

Despite the stomach pains and embarrassment laxatives can cause when taken in such high doses, Emily continued to use them.

She added: "It's the best feeling in the world. You feel so fat the whole time you go from being bloated to being completely empty and psychologically you feel thinner because you've emptied yourself, there is nothing inside you.

"Even when I stopped being bulimic and was verging on anorexia and was barely eating, let alone binging, it was still giving you that longing feeling that in a twisted sort of way made you feel better about yourself."

Preventing abuse

Emily says it's far too easy for people to get their hands on laxatives and would like to see them sold from behind the counter at chemists.

She thinks that way people with eating disorders would recognise how dangerous they could be if used for reasons other than constipation.

"Cigarettes and alcohol you at least need ID," she said. "It's not even like paracetamol where you need to be 16."

Mary George from Beat said: "Our charity are calling upon pharmaceutical and pharmacological industries to work together to ensure that these products are not used inappropriately or made so available and so prevent them being abused by so many."

The British Pharmacological Society says it's keen to support anything that reduces the opportunity for drugs to be abused.

David Pruce form the Royal Pharmaceutical Society of Great Britain agreed.

He said: "We would expect pharmacists to be aware of the abuse potential of using large quantities of laxatives.

"If a pharmacist is suspicious that a customer is abusing laxatives, we would expect the pharmacist to refuse to supply the laxatives and to talk to the customer about whether they have a problem with laxative abuse in a supportive manner."