Drug regulators in the U.K. say they will make Viagra available over-the-counter at pharmacies.
Pfizer Inc., the pharmaceutical company that makes the erectile dysfunction drug, will sell it in packets of four or eight, for 20 GBP or 35 GBP. And according to various publications, including Reuters and The Guardian, this would make the U.K. the first country to do allow it.
In truth, people report that there are other countries where you can buy Viagra without a prescription, including in Mexico, but it’s unclear whether those sales channels are authorized and legal. A decent amount of grey market Viagra is also sold online from those markets, and many people by them because they may be embarrassed to talk to their doctors about impotence.
Buying through grey market and unofficial channels has risks, including the possibility of buying counterfeit drugs. Those who purchase medicines this way also miss out on a doctor’s evaluation and instructions on how to take the drugs safely.
The Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency (MHRA) says this is precisely the problem they are trying to combat. Authorities have seized more than 50 million GBP of unlicensed and counterfeit medicines for impotence in the last five years, the agency says, which puts takers at risk of potentially serious side-effects.
It’s worth noting that pharmaceutical companies have other reasons to want to take their drugs over-the-counter; erectile dysfunction drugs are a huge business, but one that is facing a shakeup in the very near future.
The major drug makers with ED medicines, including Pfizer, Eli Lilly & Co. and Bayer AG, are running out of time on the exclusivity of their patents. In fact, some of Pfizer’s patents outside the U.S. have already expired.
That means in a few years, we’ll see more generic versions of these drugs at competitive prices, which means less profit for the companies that invented them, analysts say. In other words, going over-the-counter is one way Pfizer and other companies can stay competitive as the market opens up.
Transparency Market Research published a report a couple of years ago estimating that global revenue for ED drugs will have declined for an average of 4.5% a year between 2013 and 2019, to $3.4 billion.
