Instead of:

<?--1-News1-->
<b>This is option News 1 of 1</b>
</?--1-News1-->
<?--3-Third1of3-->
<b>Option Third 1 of 3</b>
</?--3-Third1of3-->

what about:

1,News,1,1
3,Third,1,3

Then you can do something like:

($num, $name, $index, $total) = split /,/, $data;