Viagra: The lethal weapon

Viagra, the most popular medicine used to treat male impotence, killed 14 Australians. Four men reportedly died of heart attacks after they took Viagra pills: two died of apoplectic seizures, and two more died of cerebral haemorrhage. Doctors cannot explain the deaths of the six other men.

Viagra pills have recently created a sandal. It was said that the pills caused pharmaceutical revolution, and the Pfizer company was counting its multi-million profits.

The story of these pills starts in 1992 in Great Britain, when the Pfizer company started pharmaceutical research. As a matter of fact, the drug was originally meant to cure some kinds of heart diseases. It soon became clear that Viagra did not help in that field, but it did help to cure another disease: impotence. When this was discovered, the company started to do everything possible to begin mass production of the wonder drug. Of course, it was said that the medicine was properly tested.

When Viagra became available in stores, there was more and more news arriving that people were actually dying of it. There is no precise statistics to describe the situation, but it is known that 69 fatal incidents were registered as of the end of 1998. However, the numerous trials against Pfizer were successful, because the drug was meant to be taken pursuant to a medical prescription only. There are a lot of fake pills as well, so it is not ruled out that those Australians died because they took a fake Viagra. On the other hand, Australians are not so poor that they need to buy fakes. It will not be possible for Pfizer to avoid more criminal proceedings if it is proved that Viagra kills people.

Vasily Bubnov PRAVDA.Ru

Translated by Dmitry Sudakov