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A Piece of the Cholesterol-Lowering Pie
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Business New Haven
9/17/2001
By: BNH
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Major U.S. pharmaceutical firms are using a direct-to-consumer advertising campaign for cholesterol lowering drugs to snatch market share freed up when Bayer Corp.'s Baycol, the No. 4 cholesterol fighter, was recalled last month. But industry analysts are taking a wait-and-see' approach regarding how the advertisements and fallout from the recall will impact sales of the drugs, called statins, from firms such as Bristol-Myers Squibb, Pfizer and Merck.
In the period since Baycol, manufactured in Bayer's West Haven facility, was removed from the market after being linked to 52 deaths, full-page ads ran in major U.S. newspapers for No. 2 medicine Zocor, from Merck, and No. 3 cholesterol drug Pravachol, from Bristol-Myers. Bristol-Myers went so far as to include a coupon in its ads, offering one month of Pravachol for free to holders of a Baycol prescription.
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