Viagra not over-the-counter drug in Europe
This might be a little old but for those of you who have missed this headline, here it goes again. Europeans who are wishing that Viagra be made available to them as an over-the-counter drug will have to wait longer before their wishes can become a reality. And if that wish fails to become a reality at all then they can blame it on the government panel who opposed the selling of Viagra within the European Union without a prescription.
In view of this opposition and the realization that it is difficult to change the status of Viagra in Europe, Pfizer withdrew its application for the over-the-counter selling of Viagra in the EU market. However, Viagra stays in the UK as a prescription medicine. Viagra is the first erectile dysfunction medication approved by the United States Food and Drug Administration. It is presently the leader among the three erectile dysfunction drugs in the market, sales-wise, which includes Levitra and Cialis.
Despite its withdrawal, Pfizer said Viagra meets all the European Commission guidelines and requirements for non-prescription drugs. The European Medicines Agency’s Committee for Medicinal Products for Human Use apparently thinks otherwise since they opposed Pfizer’s application.
Thousands of erectile dysfunction patients use Viagra worldwide and Pfizer medical and regulatory affairs vice president Rory O’Connor said they will continue to work with EU regulators to come up with much improved and quality medicines. In the meantime, Pfizer said it will evaluate further data which might help them with their application in the future.
A change of its EU status from a prescription to an over-the-counter medicine would have increased future sales figures for Viagra. This is very important considering that Pfizer’s shares went down by $1.11 to $14.45 per share. This is not however a cause for worry since the shares of majority of the biopharmaceutical companies also went down generally by 5.4%.
Viagra’s worldwide sales figure of $509 million is however an indication that it is still the market leader when it comes to erectile dysfunction drugs whether it changes its status from prescription to over-the-counter.
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