Viagra touches off consumer media campaign
Thursday July 9 1:39 PM EDT
By Isadore Barmash
NEW YORK (Reuters) - Drug maker Pfizer Inc. has launched an aggressive consumer campaign to ease public concern over the side effects of the company's Viagra medication for treating male impotence.
Full-page advertisements recently appeared in leading magazines such as Time, Newsweek, People, U.S. News and World Report, Life and Mature Outlook, in an effort to reach millions of Americans and deflect some of the negative publicity that the highly popular impotence pill has drawn.
The push in mainstream media followed prominent advertisements Pfizer placed in 50 medical journals to apprise doctors of Viagra's benefits and risks. There have been about 30 reported deaths of men who took Viagra although Pfizer and medical experts say that the fatalities occurred not because the pill is dangerous but because it was used by men with cardiac problems or those who used other drugs that should not be taken with Viagra.
Yet, despite the concerns and media flak raised by the deaths, Viagra sales are zooming and are affecting the activity and sales of the entire male sexual dysfunction category.
Data supplied by IMS Health, a health care information company, showed 2.9 million Viagra prescriptions were written from the time it went on sale in April through June, which would exceed all records for previous new drugs. The number of prescriptions would account for estimated sales of $259.5 million, IMS said.
At Walgreen Co., one of the biggest U.S. drug store chains, the number of Viagra prescriptions shot up in May but came down "a little bit" in June, spokesman Michael Polzin said. "But it still ranks as one of our 10 most-dispensed prescriptions," he said. The blue pill is being sold in all of Walgreen's 2,490 drug stores.
The Viagra price at Walgreen's depends on the amount prescribed, Polzin said. Normally costing $10 a pill, Viagra is often prescribed in 10-pill amounts, which cost about $90, he said.
Publicity over Viagra appears to be creating interest in the entire male sexual dysfunction category but is also hurting sales of some competitive remedies. This is reflected both in data supplied by IMS and by drug chains.
In the last two weeks of June, for example, Viagra prescriptions totaled 452,849 while sales of the next two most-dispensed prescriptions came to less than 9,000 and 6,200, respectively, IMS said. "Viagra has gained a 97.6 percent share of the entire male dysfunction market in a short time," an IMS official said.
"Viagra has drawn awareness to the entire category of male dysfunctional remedies," said Jerry Harrison, a registered pharmacist and director of professional community relations at Genovese Drug Stores, a 135-store chain operating on Long Island and in New York City.
"It has taken off with a volume that rivals any other drug ever promoted but it has had some interesting effects on the other dysfunctional products," he said.
"People using the other products have wanted to switch to Viagra because doctors are recommending it," he added, "and it has significantly diminished sales of the rest of the category. At the same time, because of the excitement it has caused, it is making men who want Viagra but can't take for medical reasons, to get the Viagra alternatives instead. These include men who are cardiac patients or who use nitroglycerins tablets, so that there could be some life-threatening problems by taking Viagra. But, still, we see some of those people ignoring those concerns and asking for Viagra."
Pfizer has confirmed that some Viagra deaths were patients using drugs with nitrate, which is "contraindicated" for Viagra, a Pfizer spokeswoman said. "The safety and efficacy of the pill is consistent with what we saw in the initial, clinical tests. Our package labeling has been clear on the subject," she said, "and we have seen no reason to change it."
The new consumer campaign may be expanded, Pfizer's spokeswoman said, although no decision has been made. There are no plans as yet to use television or radio for advertising. Pfizer's advertising agency for Viagra is Cline, Davis and Mann, New York.
Pfizer's problems with the negative publicity surrounding Viagra have not been its only headaches. Recently, an entity called the American Urological Clinic introduced a medication that it called "Vaegra" and Pfizer promptly sued the company for patent infringement. On April 21, the U.S. District Court in Atlanta issued a temporary restraining order against the "Vaegra" product.
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