TECH

Twenty years of Viagra, a pill fruit of chance

Maybe you got it right. Or maybe not. But surely, a vast majority of readers who have seen those three words will have thought the same: Viagra. That with only three tracks people - regardless of their country or language - think of the same brand is a marketing miracle. Companies around the world spend millions on getting something similar: that at least one of their products is identified throughout the world with a simple slogan (McDonald's), a music composed of a pair of notes (Lottery Christmas) or a color (Coca-Cola).

Sildenafil known and recognized under the brand Viagra, has achieved in just a couple of decades. His greatest achievement, however, is not to have penetrated the collective imagination of half the world. Not even their virtuous effect on the bass, which so many couples has saved for 20 years. Neither does it belong to that select group of expansive gender words that can be used in both masculine and feminine. If anything can brag about Viagra is to be a child of chance. Along with penicillin X-rays or cognac is part of the serendipity league.Because in what worked during the 1990s the impellers of Viagra was not a drug against erectile dysfunction, but a medicine for angina. Based on Robert F. Furchgott's research on the biochemical effect of nitrogen monoxide or nitric oxide (NO) on the body, pharmacologists sought effective treatment against hypertension. Thanks to his work Furchgott would demonstrate the influence of NO on the cardiovascular system. For that achievement in 1998 received the Nobel of Medicine together with his colleagues and compatriots Louis J. Ignarro and Ferid Murad.
In 1992, Pfizer tested the new drug in Merthyr Tydfil, a small village in Wales, which is now just over 63,000 neighbors. The results were a fiasco. The efficacy of the drug - then christened UK-92480 - was not as expected. At least for angina, of course. The doctors who controlled the clinical practice had noticed that the pill had some side effects among the volunteers: indigestion, back pain and ... Proverbial erections! It is easy to imagine the astonishment of Pfizer's managers when they learned of this fortunate chance.The pharmacist showed off her commercial vision and gave a 180 degree turn to her studies. The drug had been a nuisance to treat angina, but perhaps it would serve another problem: erectile dysfunction. Said and done. In a matter of years that little pill that had given so many alegrías to the volunteers of Merthyr Tydfil became the now famous Viagra. The company patented it in 1996 and two years later - on March 27, 1998 - obtained the approval of the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) for commercialization. Spain took a little longer to arrive. Here the pharmacies did not dispense it until November of the 98. This year the blue pill celebrates its 20th anniversary.
In a short time, Viagra became an overwhelming success. Two weeks after the FDA gave the go-ahead, doctors had prescribed more than 150,000 prescriptions. The drug that took advantage of the vasodilating effects of sildenafil citrate was even covered by Time magazine in May 1998. It is reported that the CIA itself used it in 2008 to purchase information on insurgents in Afghanistan. Referents of the 1990s, such as Brazilian soccer player Pelé (O Rei) or Republican candidate to the White House in 1996, Bob Dole, lent themselves to promote the new drug. By their example they also contributed to overthrowing - or beginning to crack, at least - the taboo of impotence.Of what there is no doubt is that the Viagra made of gold to the pharmacist. Over the past two decades, it has been estimated that 65 million prescriptions have been dispensed to patients spread across the globe. Not even in their wildest dreams could Pfizer's executives imagine what the scope of the new drug would be. Only the first year was $ 1 billion, ten times more than expected.
Although the brand is still very popular and is recognized from ocean to ocean, Viagra has already spent its golden years. In mid-2013 the first generic versions began to be marketed in Europe and in 2017 they were made in the USA. As El País picked up in March - to coincide with the 20th anniversary of the FDA's approval - over the last five years sales of the drug fell by about 42%, from the 2.1 billion that it billed in 2012 last year to about 1,200.To this increased competition in pharmacies is added the much more dangerous of underground circuits. To circumvent the appointment with the urologist or get drugs without actually needing them, some users choose to buy the pills on the Internet. Pfizer itself warned in 2013 of the risks of using websites that do not offer the least health guarantee. "Among the ingredients found in some supposed drugs for erectile dysfunction have been located paint, printer ink, amphetamines, caffeine or talcum powder," he warned.
After all ...
- pill
- Blue
- Sex
It may lead us to think of the drug that was born by serendipity 20 years ago in the lands of Merthyr Tydfil, but to be in fact a dangerous imitation elaborated with dust and blue ink. The games - better - only words.


H. T.