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Biotech / Medical : PFE (Pfizer) How high will it go? -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Anthony Wong who wrote (1529)	4/23/1998 5:14:00 PM
From: Brian Malloy	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 9523

Yes Celebra is a COX-2 Inhibitor. MRK, Seale and a few other companies are well on their way to getting this class of drugs to the Market. You can read the press release from MRK's COX-2 drug to get a feel for how they operate. biz.yahoo.com

To: Anthony Wong who wrote (1529)	4/23/1998 5:19:00 PM
From: Anthony Wong	Respond to of 9523

From Bloomberg: Vivus Rises as Analysts See Boost From Use of Pfizer's Viagra Bloomberg April 23, 1998, 12:46 p.m. PT Vivus Rises as Analysts See Boost From Use of Pfizer's Viagra Mountain View, California, April 23 (Bloomberg) -- Vivus Inc. shares rose as much as 55 percent on expectations that the company's impotence treatment would benefit from a ''coattail'' effect of Pfizer's new impotence pill, Viagra. Shares of Mountain View, California-based Vivus rose as much as 4 7/16 to 12 7/16 in trading of more than 12 million shares, more than 10 times the stock's previous three-month average. The shares jumped after an analyst at Cruttenden Roth Inc. released a report saying that Vivus's Muse product would eventually benefit from the rush to try Pfizer's Viagra, analysts said. A number of patients won't derive benefit from Pfizer's pill and then may look for something else, analysts said. ''When patients fail Viagra, they're going to go to Muse,'' said Steve Lisi, an analyst at Mehta Partners. ''I'm a complete believer in the coattail theory.'' Prescriptions for Muse are on the decline now and probably won't pick up for a while until some patients start to give up on Viagra, Lisi said. ''No one knows what the timing is,'' he said. Vivus shares also rose when Pfizer's drug was first approved last month, on anticipation that the publicity surrounding the impotence pill would expand the overall market for impotence treatments. Vivus' Muse system delivers an anti-impotence drug through the urethra. Nearly a third of the men who try Viagra won't be helped by the pill, the company and U.S. Food and Drug Administration said when it was first approved. Add to that side effects -- such as headache and dizziness -- that may discourage some users, and the potential for spill-over into Vivus's product exists, analysts said. Analysts say Viagra could have sales of between $1 billion and $4 billion a year eventually. Its sales so far have exceeded expectations. Doctors say that at any one time, 10 percent of adult men suffer from impotence. Episodes increase with age, particularly in those with medical problems such as diabetes, high blood pressure, alcoholism or obesity. Psychological issues also play a role, though doctors say that treatment of physical symptoms can help resolve them. Texas-based Zonagen Inc. and TAP Holdings Inc., a joint venture of Abbott Park, Illinois-based Abbott Laboratories and Japan's Takeda Chemical Industries Ltd., are also developing oral medications to treat the condition. --Kristin Jensen in the Washington newsroom (202) 624-1843 with