Mungo Soggot
DEPRESSIVES hooked on “happy” drug Prozac have something new to be down about: the drug for which they have been paying more than R300 a box is actually available at less than half the price, provided they ask for it by the right name.
United States company Eli Lilly, inventor of the wonder drug, is now selling three versions of it in South Africa. A South African company is manufacturing and marketing its own generic version of the drug, undercutting Eli Lilly’s prices.
Pharmacists said this week that the only differences between the drugs lay in their marketing – and the colour of the capsules.
But the original Prozac, the one most users demand and their doctors prescribe, sells for R305 a box. Eli Lilly’s generic, Lilly Fluoxetine, introduced in January, is available at R181. And South African company Lennon is marketing Lorien, which costs just R124,37.
All you have to do to get the cheaper drugs is to ask for them.
“There is a segment of the market where lower-cost, high-quality medication is required and we have thus made lower-priced Fluoxetine available to this sector,” Eli Lilly said in a statement this week.
The products, the company said, are “totally different” though they are “chemically similar”.
“While Lilly Fluoxetine is simply made available, Prozac is heavily supported through ongoing research and development of new indications and continuing dissemination of updated information to health care professionals by medical specialists and a highly qualified team of representatives,” the company added.
Others disagree with Eli Lilly’s diagnosis. Dr Anthony Teggin, a Cape Town psychiatrist, said Lilly Fluoxetine was “packed in different coloured capsules to fool the public as well as the prescribing doctors”.
He said many patients were so keen on Prozac that they actually refused to take generic substitutes.
Teggin said that under current pharmaceutical legislation a pharmacist cannot sell the cheaper generic if a doctor’s prescription says Prozac – a situation which the Minister of Health, Nkosazana Zuma, is seeking to change with her legislative drive in favour of generic medicines.
“Dr Zuma wishes to change this, but her detractors continue to lie, misquote and undermine her and her motives. Why, you may ask. Well, I guess a lot of money is at stake.” Teggin, a Jungian analyst, said that five million US citizens take Prozac annually – including Madonna and Bill Clinton.
Eli Lilly started preparing Lilly Fluoxetine in the run-up to the expiry of its patent in January. The company also released another identical drug, Prozyn, which it markets jointly with another South African drug company.
Prozyn sells for the same as Prozac, though Teggin said he could obtain it for as little as R178,53 in Cape Town.
Eli Lilly said it could not comment on the retail prices of its drugs but said Prozac’s factory price was R147,29 and Lilly Fluoxetine R87,42.
“The revenues from Prozac help fund continuing medical education programmes, patient support programmes as well as other much needed activities in the mental health arena, where there is a particular shortage of funding in South Africa,” Eli Lilly added.