Aspirin generally shouldn’t be used to prevent heart attacks or stroke for patients with no history of the disease, U.S. regulators said today.
The use of the medicine raises serious risks of bleeding in the stomach and brain, the Food and Drug Administration said in a statement. While evidence shows that aspirin’s benefits for people who have already had a cardiovascular event outweigh the increased risk of bleeding, the data doesn’t support using the drug to help people prevent a first attack, the agency said.
