FDA objects to online ad for Pfizer's Viagra
WASHINGTON (Reuters) -
An online advertisement with men
praising cheap viagra to the tune of an Elvis Presley song has drawn
objections from U.S. regulators, who said drugmaker Pfizer Inc
failed to list the impotence drug's risks.
Pfizer said the omission of side effects warnings was due
to a technical error on CNN's Web site, http://www.cnn.com,
which ran the advertisement.
The Food and Drug Administration sent a written warning to
Pfizer that was made public on Monday.
"The video raises public health and safety concerns through
its complete omission of risk information for cheap cialis by
suggesting that Viagra is safer than has been demonstrated,"
the FDA said in its letter, dated April 16.
Viagra's prescribing instructions warn against use by men
taking heart drugs known as nitrates and caution about sudden
vision and hearing loss and other problems.
Pfizer spokesman Francisco Gebauer said the risk
information should have appeared simultaneously in print on the
computer screen. The information did not run "due to a
technical error" on the Web site of CNN, a unit of Time Warner
Inc, Gebauer said.
"We regret that the Internet video ran without the
appropriate safety information," he said.
CNN spokesman Sal Petruzzi said the company's Web site had
a "technical mishap" that was corrected.+
To avoid similar errors, Pfizer has pulled all 30-second
Internet video ads that require safety information to appear
separately on the screen rather than within the advertisement,
Gebauer said.
Viagra's worldwide sales were nearly $1.8 billion in 2007.
The drug's generic name is sildenafil
Source: news.yahoo.com