OVER 500 men in Cyprus are taking the anti-baldness pill Propecia, which has taken the world by storm with over a million devotees around the globe.
“More than 500 men are taking it in Cyprus and over a million worldwide,” the medical representative of Propecia in Cyprus, Irini Papademetriou, said yesterday.
The Managing Director of The Hair Design Centre, Pantelis Stellehas, says it is the only pill that is effective in combating male genetic hair loss – an affliction that he says blights half of all men under the age of 50.
“More than 50 per cent of our customers who take it are satisfied with the result,” he said.
Some 120 patients treated by the centre are taking the drug, dispensed only for the last eight months.
“The hair doesn’t grow again, but it stops people from losing more hair and some say that the condition of the hair improves as well,” he added.
Propecia is prescribed once a day for six months before any results can be detected. A month’s packet costs around £35.
Stellehas warns the pill has a 20 per cent failure rate.
But Papademetriou nevertheless expects sales to swell as more balding people hear about the wonder drug.
“We believes it gives the only solution for young people with genetic baldness, especially in the early stages. People can even regain hair,” she claimed.
Men who suffer from severe genetic hair loss generally start balding in their early 20s, while others begin between the ages of 25 and 35.
The medication is approved by the Food and Drug Association in the USA and considered the only prescribed drug for hair loss that actually works.
Papademetriou said Propecia had no damaging side effects, despite reports that it could affect patients’ sperm-count.
The Hair Design Centre also prescribes anti-antigen drops and Monoxil – available in one solution – to protect the follicle, taken alongside or in the place of Propecia.
More costly methods of disguising baldness come in the form of trans-dermal hair restoration or microscopic follicular hair re-growth, which implants donor hair or follicles taken from the patient’s own head.
Women are not advised to take Propecia, because of complications that can occur during or before pregnancy, nor is female hair loss hereditary.
The Cyprus Mail is the only English-language daily newspaper published in Cyprus. It was established in 1945 and today, with its popular and widely-read website, the Cyprus Mail is among the most trusted news sites in Cyprus. The newspaper is not affiliated with any political parties and has always striven to maintain its independence. Over the past 70-plus years, the Cyprus Mail, with a small dedicated team, has covered momentous events in Cyprus’ modern history, chronicling the last gasps of British colonial rule, Cyprus’ truncated independence, the coup and Turkish invasion, and the decades of negotiations to stitch the divided island back together, plus a myriad of scandals, murders, and human interests stories that capture the island and its -people. Observers describe it as politically conservative.
