This article depicts how ”Repurposing’ drugs for different ailments is cheaper than testing new ones’, which pharmaceutical companies have realised following famous previous accidental breakthroughs by US pharmaceutical group Pfizer.
For example:’It was probably a bad day at the lab when scientists at the US drug group Pfizer’s now defunct Sandwich research centre realised an angina treatment they were developing – a compound called sildenafil – simply didn’t work.
It might have been the end of the road for compound UK-92,480 but the drug did have an interesting side-effect: three days after swallowing the pill the male volunteers testing the medicine got a prolonged erection.
The treatment was refined and the time delay reduced. It was branded as Viagra and has become a blockbuster, prescribed for erectile dysfunction.’
‘It isn’t the only drug originally tested for one purpose that has become a treatment for another. Rogaine, also by Pfizer, was originally developed to treat high blood pressure but is now a successful treatment for hair loss.’
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