What if you can't get acetaminophen?

Recently, all over the country ushered in the Omicron virus infection peak, within a time, the market of acetaminophen and other antipyretic, analgesic drugs become scarce, drugstore inventory is in short supply, people's mood cast a layer of anxiety shadow.

What if you can't get acetaminophen? In fact, acetaminophen is not a rare rare drug, not only a single preparation, many cold medicines have it as the main ingredient.

According to the latest statistics (data as of December 16, 2022), there are 3,027 approvals for the marketing of chemicals containing acetaminophen (involving 1,124 companies and 169 drugs; 99 prescription drugs, 70 over-the-counter drugs).

Chinese patent medicine containing Western medicine ingredients are no longer fresh, most of the antipyretic and analgesic Chinese patent medicine on the market, have added acetaminophen, including Ganqingpian, Ganlingcapsules (granules), vitamin C Yinqiao tablets, Pugan tablets, etc. According to the latest statistics, there are 40 Chinese patent medicines containing acetaminophen.

The following is a detailed market analysis report on acetaminophen.

1. Market status of drugs containing acetaminophen in China

Acetaminophen, also known as paracetamol and translated into paracetamol in China, is a non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drug that can inhibit the synthesis of prostaglandins and has antipyretic and analgesic effects. It can be used to relieve high fever caused by the common cold or influenza and to relieve mild to moderate pain symptoms.

(1) Marketing situation of chemical drugs

According to the latest statistics of Yaozhi Data (the data is up to December 16, 2022, the same below), there are 3,027 approval documents for the marketing of chemical drugs containing acetaminophen (due to space limitation, please pay attention to the detailed information of Yaozhi Enterprise version of China Listed drugs database), among which there are 1,124 enterprises involved and 169 drugs; Among them, 99 were prescription drugs and 70 were over-the-counter drugs; 6 class A medical insurance drugs and 26 Class B medical insurance drugs; See Table 1 for the marketing status of domestic drugs containing acetaminophen.

Among the marketing approvals for chemicals containing acetaminophen, the top three were: acetaminophen tablets (749), amkahuangmin capsules (443) and children's acetaminophen Huangnamin granules (260).

From the perspective of enterprises, the top three enterprises in terms of the number of approvals for the marketing of chemical drugs containing acetaminophen were Gansu Lanyao Pharmaceutical Co., LTD. (21), China Resources Double He Pharmaceutical Co., LTD. (15) and Shanghai Johnson & Johnson Pharmaceutical Co., LTD. (14).

(2) Consistency evaluation of registration

According to the data statistics of the pharmaceutical wisdom registration database, the chemical drugs containing acetaminophen according to the consistency of the declaration of acceptance number of 37, involving 2 drugs, 33 enterprises; There were 17 acceptance numbers for generic drug application, involving 8 drugs and 14 enterprises.

In the aspect of completion of evaluation, 28 acceptance numbers passed the consistency evaluation, and 3 acceptance numbers approved the listing of generic drugs, involving a total of 4 drugs and 32 enterprises.

(3) Varieties of proprietary Chinese medicine

Chinese patent medicine contains western medicine ingredients are no longer new, most of the antipyretic and analgesic Chinese patent medicine on the market, have added acetaminophen, including Ganqingpian, Ganlingcapsules (granules), vitamin C Yinqiao tablet, Pugan tablet, etc.

According to the search results of Yaozhi Chinese patent medicine prescription database, there are 40 Chinese patent medicines containing acetaminophen.

Ii. Sales of acetaminophen

According to the retrieval results of Yaozhi Data Hospital sales data mining system, from 2016 to 2021, there were 120 drugs containing acetaminophen, involving 558 enterprises. The top three drugs in terms of sales volume were acetaminophen oxycodone tablets, children's acetaminophen Huangnamin granules and compound acetaminophen alkanamine capsules.

From the perspective of enterprise sales, from 2016 to 2021, Johnson & Johnson had the largest sales volume of acetaminophen containing drugs sold in hospitals with 1.721 billion yuan, followed by Specgx LLC and Zhejiang Kant Pharmaceutical Group Co., LTD.

In addition, the total sales volume of acetaminophen drugs decreased significantly in 2020, by 34.38% compared with that in 2019. Therefore, the sales volume in 2020 and 2021 decreased significantly compared with the previous four years, and the overall sales market is relatively considerable at present.

Iii. Market situation of acetaminophen API

At present, with the increasing demand for acetaminophen drugs, the corresponding API market has undergone great changes. The following is a statistical analysis of the domestic API market from the two aspects of domestic API registration and dosage:

(1) Registration of acetaminophen in China

According to the search results of the registration database of API, pharmaceutical excipients and pharmaceutical packaging materials, there are currently 34 registered enterprises of acetaminophen API in China, including 32 domestic, 1 overseas and 1 domestic. Among them, 27 apis have been approved for use in marketed dosage forms, and 7 have not passed the review and approval related to preparations.

(2) The dosage of acetaminophen raw materials

According to the data base of raw material Consumption, there were 386 companies using acetaminophen apis between 2016 and 2021, and a total of 775.16 tons were used in 2021, an increase of 3.18 percent year-on-year.

In terms of the total amount of enterprise use, Johnson & Johnson has the largest use of acetaminophen API in China from 2016 to 2021, followed by Sino-US Shanghai Squibb Pharmaceutical Co., Ltd. and Diao Group Chengdu Pharmaceutical Co., LTD.

Warm reminder

Different drugs, though, contain the same active ingredient and can be substituted for each other. But especially remind you, in the use of acetaminophen antipyretic and analgesic drugs, should read the corresponding instructions, containing the same acetaminophen ingredients of drugs to do: use one at a time, such as the effect is not good, generally in 6 hours after the use of other.

If the same active ingredient is used repeatedly, acetaminophen will accumulate in the body, and when it exceeds the safe value of human body, serious liver damage and even liver failure and other side effects will occur.