10/26 14:55 Watch for Viagra fakes, trade commission warns
By Maggie Fox, Health and Science Correspondent
WASHINGTON, Oct 26 (Reuters) - Embarrassed and misinformed
consumers who are afraid to go to their doctors are wide open to fraudsters
selling impotence "cures", the U.S. Federal Trade Commission said on
Monday.
The FTC issued a warning to the public about such con artists, who also prey
on people looking for miracle diet pills.
"Fraud is trendy. It rides the edge of new waves," Sondra Mills, an FTC lawyer
who has prosecuted two cases against impotence hucksters, told a conference
sponsored by the National Institutes of Health.
And there is nothing trendier than impotence, thanks in part to the huge success
of Pfizer's <PFE.N> Viagra, the first pill for impotence. "It's in. It's very big,
and it is attracting increasing talented and well-financed con artists," she said.
The worst offender so far was 30-year-old David Brady, who sold at least
eight different fake products to unsuspecting customers. He made up
important-sounding companies to back his products, made up medical journals
and misquoted well-known impotence specialists as backing his claims.
The FTC says Brady and his companies used direct mail to sell a range of
unapproved products with names such as "Alprostaglandin", "The
Celldenaphil-pc System", "Ranak-pc", "Oral Phentalomil", "Urophil" and
"Vaegra".
Pfizer sued Brady. He settled out of court and changed the name of his
"Vaegra" and "Celldenaphil" products (the name Celldenaphil sounds like
sildenafil, the generic name for Viagra) and marketed them as "safe" alternatives
to Viagra.
So the FTC went after him.
"We had an investigator order some 'Alprostaglandin'," one of the products
Brady was selling by direct mail and on the Internet, Mills said. It contained
supplements commonly found in health food stores, including L-arginine, saw
palmetto, homeopathic remedies and ginseng.
Checks with doctors, homeopaths and alternative medicine practitioners
confirmed none of the ingredients could help impotence.
The FTC had a court freeze Brady's assets, which were worth between $3 and
$4 million. There were no clinics or laboratories -- Brady worked out of a post
office box and a warehouse in Atlanta.
But people were taken in -- by the tens of thousands.
"In a little over a year Brady sold his products to 150,000 customers," Mills
said.
Brady had featured his "clinic" in one of the brochures, with a picture of a shiny
new high-rise. The address in Seattle given was actually a post office substation.
Postal employees there testified that dozens of hopeful men had come in there,
looking for Brady's offices.
"Everyone who purchased a Brady product believed that he was dealing with a
legitimate medical enterprise," Mills said.
Dr. Irwin Goldstein of the Boston University School of Medicine and an expert
in impotence said his name was used by Brady and his clinic got flooded with
calls and letters.
"Many men are so embarrassed and don't want to speak to their physicians," he
said. But impotence could be caused by serious disease, such as diabetes, and
it is vital for men to get proper physicals if they develop erectile dysfunction.
Mills said impotence has become such a big subject that the FTC wants to
warn everyone about such scams.
"If the product is advertised as effective for treating impotence -- and no
physician's prescription is necessary -- forget it. It won't cure the condition," the
warning reads.
"If the product is promoted by a "medical organization", call your physician to
check the credentials," it advises. "Phony 'clinics' and sham 'institutes' are
touring bogus cures for impotence."
Also, if a product claims its effects are scientifically tested, this should also be
checked with a doctor.
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