Public Citizen Compares Viagra And Cialis Against Lipitor To Find Out The Answer
Sidney M. Wolfe, MD, Director of Public Citizen's Health Research Group, recently alleged that there have been inadequate warnings that erectile dysfunction drugs can cause blindness. Relatedly, he announced the results of a comparison test intended to make the point that the FDA and the drug companies responsible for the erectile dysfunction (ED) drugs Viagra, Cialis, and Levitra are, perhaps, misleading the public about the alleged link between these drugs and ischemic optic neuropathy (ION).
Dr. Wolfe sets the stage by drawing attention to the standard position asserted by the FDA and the drug companies, that the men using the ED drugs who have been stricken with ION are patients with cardiovascular risk factors, and it is those factors, not the Viagra, Cialis, nor Levitra, which caused the blindness. To determine the validity of this position, Dr. Wolfe designed a comparison test using the cholesterol drug Lipitor as the control -- the idea being that people using Lipitor were another patient population with cardiovascular risk factors. Dr. Wolfe wanted to find out whether Lipitor users were experiencing this blindness at the same rate as men who had developed ION after taking Viagra or Cialis.
For the sake of precision, we let Dr. Wolfe set forth the findings of that Viagra and Cialis v. Lipitor comparison test:
"For Viagra, there were 18 times more reports of ION per million prescriptions than for Lipitor and, for Cialis, 25 times more reports. Thus, it is very likely that the drugs can actually cause blindness in some people. Further evidence of causation can be seen in a case report in which one patient using Cialis suffered reversible visual field defects each time within 2 hours after taking 4 sequential doses of Cialis and suffered permanent partial loss of vision shortly after the fifth dose."
Based on these findings and other research, the consumer advocacy group Public Citizen has petitioned the FDA to immediately require the respective drug companies to add a "black-box" warning on the package insert labels for Viagra, Cialis, and Levitra. In addition, the Public Citizen petition calls for the institution of a registry of all reported cases of blindness, specifically ischemic optic neuropathy or ION, following one's use of an ED drug.
(Posted by: Tom Lamb)