<<If the market was unimportant, why did they go for approval and the initial sales? >>
It is not a question of IF the Mexican market for a relatively expensive oral ED medication is
unimportant. I hope we can at least agree that Mexico is a poor country, most of whose population
could not afford such drugs. This is far from an optimum market for Vasomax. As for sales, all we
know is that Schering bought some product from Zonagen. There is no evidence that they pushed for
sales or profits. That will come with U.S. approval.
I think that's irrational, Bruce. There are some sales in Mexico of Viagra. Viagra is still being sold there. It's not a wealthy market, of course. We do agree about that. But Schering did get it approved and did stuff a pipeline there anyway, and sales didn't ensue. The pharmacies and physicians that did carry it would have been likely to mention it as an alternative. They don't like getting stuck with drugs, either. But sales were poor and repeat sales were more poor.
No one reordered, because it didn't work. If none were sold at all, all would have been returned to Schering and more royalties would have had to be refunded. The fact that only a few thousand dollars were refunded means that there were initial sales but not re-orders.
ZONA doesn't have other drugs with which to offset the royalty, so all of the drug would have been returned for refund that wasn't sold. That means that most of the initial sell was sold to end-buyers, but that they didn't re-order. They didn't re-order because it didn't work -- not because they couldn't afford to buy it a second time. There are some Viagra sales in Mexico.
We don't know how many Mexican men tried Vasomax.
We don't know what percentage had success.
We would know if there was a good success rate, because Schering is interested in proving that. So I am sure that if the drug did well, Schering would have told everyone. The silence suggests poor performace, as does the lack of reorders.
You say they were gathering information in Mexico. I ask you what kind of information they would have been gathering? If it wasn't sales info (we know sales were poor) and it wasn't efficacy info (we deduce efficacy was poor by the lack of repeat sales) what other information were they gathering?
--Linda |
