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To: Anthony Wong who wrote (825)	9/19/1998 1:20:00 PM
From: Anthony Wong	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 1722

Six-month Viagra trials to precede registration [in China] South China Morning Post Friday September 18 1998 RHONDA LAM WAN in Singapore Clinical trials on the impotence drug Viagra will start in three mainland areas this month, a leading urologist said yesterday. Professor Xue Zhaoying, director of the Institute of Urology at Beijing Medical University, said the State Pharmaceutical Administration had given the green light to recruit 500 patients from Beijing, Shanghai and Hubei province to test the oral impotence drug. "Some 500 pills, of which a quarter will be placebo, will be given to the patients, with neither doctors nor patients knowing if they are receiving the real drug," said Professor Xue. "The trials are expected to last six months and people can expect the formal registration late next year." Professor Xue said the trials followed the completion of a preliminary test on dosage and complications on 30 people from a Beijing university earlier this year. He was speaking at the fourth Asian Congress of Urology. A study showed more than 70 per cent of men in Shanghai, aged 40 or over, experienced impotence, against 52 per cent from a similar study in the American state of Massachusetts. The Shanghai study, in which more than 1,500 men were interviewed in March, showed 1,157 - 73 per cent of the respondents - had experienced impotence. Professor Xue said he could not speculate on the reasons of higher occurrence and severity among Chinese men as a final review of the study was pending. However, it was understood China's high smoking rate was likely to be a contributing factor. "People smoking 15 cigarettes or above daily and those with a smoking history of 15 years are more likely to suffer from the problem," said the professor. He said fast official approval of Viagra would help wipe out local black markets in which tablets were selling for up to 500 yuan (HK$465) each. The public would have to bear the cost of the drug once it was permitted but Professor Xue hoped the price would be about 100 yuan per pill. "It should not be very expensive. It is meaningless to rekindle people's hope and then ask them to choose between sex and food," he said. Co-speaker Professor Zhu Jichuan, chief of the urology department at the People's Hospital of Beijing Medical University, predicted the number of men suffering impotence would reach 410 million worldwide by the year 2005. scmp.com