Therapeutic functional food rises quietly in the pharmaceutical market

Some foreign market analysts observed that in the past 10 years, a new health food named "therapeutic functional food" is quietly rising in the international pharmaceutical market The same is true in China If you look at the market performance of such products, you can see their development track In recent years, a kind of therapeutic functional food, such as "melatonin", deep sea fish oil, propolis, ganoderma spore powder and various blood glucose lowering health food, has achieved outstanding sales performance, which is very popular in China's market Among them, brain platinum, which is mainly composed of melatonin, once achieved an annual sales of more than 1 billion yuan in its peak sales years According to the current development trend of the international market, functional foods with a certain therapeutic effect (which are considered as health products in China) seem to be more popular with consumers This is particularly the case in the United States With the rise of glucosamine and fish oil, the American nutritionists believe that all functional foods with certain therapeutic effect (i.e health food) can be classified as "therapeutic functional foods" The implication is that although these products are still food products, they do have some therapeutic effect on human body Chitin glucosamine is a typical example In the early 1980s, western researchers first found that chitin, a natural polysaccharide from the shell of marine shrimp and crab, can become an excellent "sixth nutrient" (natural dietary fiber) after acid hydrolysis, which can be used to prevent diseases such as constipation and colon cancer This product has been popular in the world pharmaceutical market since then With the deepening of research, researchers found that glucosamine also has an incredible effect of relieving rheumatoid arthritis pain and anti-inflammatory, and its effect is no less than the commonly used antipyretic and analgesic chemicals in clinical This new discovery has opened up a new way to study functional food for disease treatment So far, at least billions of glucosamine hydrochloride capsules have been sold in the world, because it has no side effects, and its effect is similar to ibuprofen and naproxen The rapid rise of glucosamine hydrochloride has opened a new channel for the rise of other therapeutic functional foods Fish oil and glucosamine are almost on the market at the same time, and it is also a therapeutic functional food The main function of fish oil preparation is to prevent arteriosclerosis, myocardial infarction and stroke As everyone knows, cardiovascular disease is the highest incidence rate of "public disease" in the world Therefore, the use of fish oil to prevent accidental cardiovascular disease is welcomed by patients with cardiovascular diseases worldwide The global sales volume is also over $1 billion per year With the deepening of scientific research, new functional foods with therapeutic effect have been developed and listed Among them, "L- theanine" (with calming and sleeping effects) from Chinese green tea, phytosterol (anti atherosclerosis) from natural plant oil, propolis (with a variety of pharmacological effects such as anti-bacterial and anti-inflammatory, anti-tumor, treatment of chronic periodontitis and reducing blood sugar, etc.), soy isoflavones (which can effectively alleviate women's postmenopausal syndrome), probiotics (including Including bifidobacteria, Lactobacillus, etc.) and various plant preparations, there are at least hundreds of them Functional food is mostly derived from plant medicine According to the "2007 World therapeutic functional food market report" recently released by Freedonia consulting company, the total sales volume of therapeutic functional food in the US market alone reached 31 billion US dollars in 2007, which will reach an amazing 45 billion US dollars in 2010 The total sales volume of therapeutic functional foods in countries and regions outside the United States is only 15.5 billion US dollars The figure is expected to rise to about $20 billion by 2010 Why, one might ask, is the U.S market for therapeutic foods so far ahead of the rest of the world? The simplest answer is: in order to evade the strict drug approval procedures of the authorities, some pharmaceutical manufacturers in the United States deliberately declare the natural botanical drugs with therapeutic effects as functional food, which can save manufacturers a lot of costs Therefore, the United States has the largest number of functional food products in the world For example, Ginkgo biloba preparation, hypericin, asiaticoside, ginseng preparation, which are regarded as drugs in China and Europe, belong to the scope of functional food in the United States In the 1990s, some newly developed plant extracts have good therapeutic effects, such as lycopene, lutein, coenzyme Q10, MSM (methyl sulfonylmethane), etc., which are now among the best-selling functional foods in the United States In the past few years, the annual growth rate of therapeutic functional foods in the United States has been as high as 10.4%, while the average annual growth rate of general functional foods is only 4.5% This shows the popularity of therapeutic functional foods among the general public in the United States Pharmaceutical analysts in the United States call the rapid development of the "therapeutic functional food" industry "a" new health care product industry not subject to FDA supervision "(because functional food is regarded as a special food, in the United States, you can apply for market only by presenting the product's non-toxic certificate to human body) According to industry insiders in the United States, the total cost of applying for listing a functional food in the United States is only 62000-99000 US dollars, which is the first year's cost After the second year, the manufacturer only needs to pay a symbolic audit fee of about $10000 per year This small amount of money is very small for the new drug review fee that often needs hundreds of millions of dollars No wonder many American manufacturers prefer to apply for the therapeutic plant medicine as functional food, rather than take time and effort to apply for the new drug certificate These plant medicine products, which are regarded as drugs in China, can be listed as functional food in the United States, which makes people in the domestic pharmaceutical industry wonder In fact, it is the detour strategy adopted by some US manufacturers to avoid the huge cost of new drug review Why are therapeutic functional foods sold more and more in the U.S market? The author sums up the following viewpoints: first, the drug prices in the United States are generally expensive, but in fact, there are still 40 million to 50 million citizens in the United States who have not participated in any medical insurance, that is to say, they must pay for their own medical treatment After getting sick, these people will first think of buying therapeutic functional food which is cheap and has therapeutic effect It is said that there are dozens of more popular anti diabetes functional foods in the United States (such as balsam pear preparation, Gymnema sylvestre preparation, green tea extract preparation, beer yeast extract preparation, cinnamon powder preparation, Lagerstroemia speciosa preparation and passion fruit preparation) Secondly, for chronic diseases such as arthritis, functional foods such as glucosamine and MSM are sometimes better than western medicine, and they are cheap and easily accepted by the poor This is the reason why therapeutic functional foods are "unique" in the US market This phenomenon is rarely seen in other developed western countries that have implemented universal health insurance Second, functional food basically has no side effects and can be taken for a long time This is quite attractive for some chronic patients who need to take medicine for a long time, especially those who are in financial difficulties Because economic factors are often important factors for patients to consider before purchasing drugs, especially in the United States, where the price of drugs is extremely high, the therapeutic functional food with low price (it is understood that the average price of therapeutic functional food in the U.S market is about $10 per bottle) just fills this market gap This is the reason why therapeutic functional foods have sprung up in the United States Third, policy and economic factors play a role As we all know, the approval of functional food by FDA in the United States is relatively loose Compared with the application of a new drug, it is much more troublesome and risky This is the real reason for the proliferation of functional food in the U.S market According to relevant media reports, there are at least 20000 functional food manufacturers in the United States, the largest number in the world, and in fact, these manufacturers are still living a good life Therefore, it is said that the United States has the most stringent drug approval system in the world and the most relaxed functional food declaration system, and the two systems go hand in hand in the United States The author believes that in the foreseeable future, therapeutic functional foods in the United States will continue to be widely used in its market, and its market development space is very huge In recent years, therapeutic functional foods have become popular in the U.S market Now, the production and marketing situation of some of them and the development trend in the future are briefly introduced as follows: therapeutic functional foods: vitamin / mineral functional foods in the U.S In the whole 90's of last century, vitamin / mineral functional food once accounted for nearly 1 / 3 of the total sales of functional food in the United States, which belongs to bulk functional food Vitamin / mineral preparations in the United States cover a wide range In addition to conventional vitamin preparations (including single agent and mixture), there are also newly developed lycopene, lutein, folic acid, various vitamin D preparations, vitamin K derivatives, new therapeutic vitamin mixture (such as VA, VC, ve oral soft capsule, which can be used to prevent acute myocardial infarction), etc After entering the 21st century, with the rise of all kinds of plant medicine functional food, at present, the sales volume of vitamin / mineral resources functional food in the United States has dropped to about half of the peak period in the 1990s, but the absolute sales volume is still rising At least in the next few years, the sales volume of vitamin / mineral functional foods in the United States will not have the possibility of substantial growth Omega-3 unsaturated fatty acid omega-3 unsaturated fatty acid refers to some active substances extracted from fish oil, and its representative varieties include EPA, DHA and DPA In the past few decades, medical researchers have confirmed that: Taking unsaturated fatty acids can effectively reduce the mortality of coronary heart disease (myocardial infarction), while the United States is recognized as a major country of coronary heart disease in the world, so since the 1990s, functional foods containing omega-3 unsaturated fatty acids have risen to the first best-selling functional foods in the United States For example, according to the latest report of domestic media in the United States, the total sales volume of various functional foods added with omega-3 unsaturated fatty acids in the United States market last year has exceeded 7 billion US dollars In addition to omega-3 unsaturated fatty acids from fish oil, flax oil extracted from linseed oil has seen a rapid increase in sales in recent years, because from a pharmacological point of view, the extremely rich γ - linolenic acid contained in flax oil has a very similar effect to the unsaturated fatty acids from fish oil Therefore, western researchers call linseed oil "fish oil on land" Flax oil is better than fish oil in that it has a natural vegetable oil flavor, so it tastes good, while fish oil has a strong fishy smell Market analysts believe that in the long run, fish oil and linseed oil functional foods with anti coronary heart disease and anti stroke effects will have broad market development space Probiotics refer to a series of microorganisms that live in human intestine and are beneficial to human body, including bifidobacteria, Lactobacillus and fecal streptococcus Japanese scholars first found that the above microorganisms have a variety of health care effects on human body (such as prevention of colorectal cancer, enteritis and other diseases), and now the concept of probiotics health care has been recognized and accepted by Western consumers At present, there are many kinds of markets in the United States