To me personally, aspirin is one with such profound appeals and ability to keep authors of many pharmacology textbooks rewriting its new uses and new findings.
Record of aspirin’s clinical use dated back in the 5th century; and it’s not until 1897 when scientists claimed to have successfully synthesized the substance, and thus started the commercialization of aspirin worldwide. 110 years later, aspirin is still used widely in modern medicine with new indications added; helping to relieve aches and pain, to rheumatic fever to saving millions of lives from strokes and heart attacks. Given the length of its clinical experience and patient exposure data, it must be one of the best tested drugs in different populations.
Another “super drug”, in my opinion, has been something more recent. Its research started in Tokyo in 1970s by a team led by Akira Endo and Masao Kuroda. The researchers studied the ability of certain substances derived from certain microorganism in inhibiting the enzymatic function of the other microorganisms. These were later isolated from Penicillium citrinum and code-named ML-236B. The American drug giant Merck & Co. later took a strong interest and isolated lovastatin to become the world’s first commercially marketed HMG-CoA reductase inhibitor. Welcome to the world of statins and the rest is history.
Needless to say, Merck & Co. made a huge fortune and that showcased one of the world’s most admirable corporate success stories. Statins have saved millions of life worldwide and amazingly, they continue to contribute and delight the medical fraternity with their new uses. Besides their powerful lipid lowering properties, recent studies have shown that the protective effects against diabetic complications, cataract, cancer etc. The world’s appetite for statins has been insatiable ever since. It’s therefore not surprising to note that Pfizer’s Lipitor (another statin) brought them about US$12 billion worth of cheers to the company in 2006. This is almost undoubtedly the world’s best selling drug of our time.
More than 30 years have gone by, we have witnessed the exciting life story of statins. Although the experience with statins is still a young adult as compared to aspirin; but it would be interesting to see 10 or perhaps 30 years later what other contribution such little discovery has contributed to mankind, and more importantly – the impact of such western medicinal products have on our lives. We hope our children, and their children, will similarly admire, then inspired to discover and design more similar noble drugs that will help relieve human suffering and illnesses.
Good luck and good health to all.
Ng Cheng Tiang
PSS President
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