<Anchor> The



hair loss drug market in Korea is growing by 20% every year.

However, as the hair loss drug sells well, patients on dialysis for kidney disease are said to be more concerned.



Dong-chan Cho, a medical reporter, will tell you why.



<Reporter>



Mr. Choi Dong-woon has been receiving dialysis three times a week since 5 years ago.



My kidney levels are well maintained, but I struggled because my high blood pressure was not controlled.



[Yoo Dong-eun/dialysis specialist: This is a person who has not been able to control his blood pressure well even though he has used all types of blood pressure medicine.] The



doctor changed the medicine for the last time and his blood pressure was lowered.



[Choi Dong-woon/Dialysis patient: I heard it at first, but my blood pressure was bad, so I replaced it with the one I am taking now (Minoxidil).]



This drug is Minoxidil, known as a hair loss medicine.



Shin, a 37-year-old living in Busan, has been receiving dialysis treatment for four years and is being treated for high blood pressure with minoxidil.



[Mr. Shin/dialysis patient: My blood pressure jumped to 200, but now I switched to minoxidil and now it's around 130 to 140.]



Minoxidil is a powerful antihypertensive drug that relaxes even damaged blood vessels in patients with kidney disease. It is popular as a hair loss medicine thanks to its side effects.



It is profitable for pharmaceutical companies to sell hair loss medicine.



That's because you can get 16 times more for the drug than if you sold it for high blood pressure, which is covered by health insurance.



Only one out of seven domestic pharmaceutical companies has supplied it for hypertension that is covered by insurance.



However, one of them has recently stopped supplying it.



[Lee Dong-hyung / Dialysis Specialist (Business Director of the Korea Dialysis Association): Production has stopped.

Most of the minoxidil is being produced as a hair loss drug supplied to the non-insured market with much greater economic benefits.]



Patients are replacing it with minoxidil for hair loss, but the burden has increased.



[Mr. Shin/dialysis patient: You have to take blood pressure medicine for the rest of your life, but the accumulated amount (cost) is honestly a burden.]



Right now, the cost of medicine is a problem, but it is also urgent to secure a stable supply of minoxidil for blood pressure.



This is because there are 120,000 dialysis patients in Korea, and more than 5% of these patients have no alternative medicine if the supply of minoxidil is stopped.

[Lee Dong-hyung / Dialysis specialist (Director of the Korea Dialysis



Association): We plan to request that we designate drugs to prevent withdrawal or implement a system equivalent thereto.]



He said he would provide.



(Video coverage: Park Jin-ho, video editing: Choi Eun-jin, CG: Jeon Yoo-geun)