Healthy Skepticism Library item: 5496
Warning: This library includes all items relevant to health product marketing that we are aware of regardless of quality. Often we do not agree with all or part of the contents.
Publication type: news
FDA Says Avoid 'Natural' Impotence Pills
Associated Press 2006 Jul 12
http://abcnews.go.com/Health/wireStory?id=2185425
Full text:
FDA Says Avoid ‘Natural’ Impotence Pills
5:22 PM PDT, July 12, 2006
WASHINGTON — Some products touted on the Internet as natural alternatives to impotence drugs like Viagra illegally contain the same active ingredients as the prescription medicines, the Food and Drug Administration said Wednesday.
The FDA warned consumers not to buy or use seven of the so-called dietary supplements, sold online to treat impotence and enhance sexual performance. The list includes a product called Zimaxx, which FDA testing showed contains sildenafil, the same active ingredient in Viagra. Viagra, made by Pfizer Inc., is sold only by prescription in the United States.
A message left for Herbal Remedies USA, a Casper, Wyo.-based company that sells Zimaxx on its Web site, was not immediately returned. The FDA has sent the company and five others letters that warn they are marketing illegal drugs based on the claims made for the products or their ingredients.
The other products named by the FDA are: Libidus, Neophase, Nasutra, Vigor-25, Actra-Rx and 4Everon. Chemical analyses showed the products contain either chemical ingredients that are similar to sildenafil or a second drug called vardenafil, the FDA said. Vardenafil is the active ingredient in Levitra, an impotence drug sold by GlaxoSmithKline PLC and Schering-Plough Corp.
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On the Net:
Food and Drug Administration: http://www.fda.gov/
