Erection Drugs Update: Sales Down, Usage Up in Men Under 55
Author: Michael Castleman, M.A.
Seven years after the approval of Viagra, the erection drug and its competitors, Cialis and Levitra, rank among the best-known pharmaceutical brands in the world. Nonetheless, total sales of the three drugs are fell 9 percent overall in 2005 from the previous year.
This is not what drug industry and media pundits expected. The experts predicted that sales would continue to increase as the male population ages, and as advertising wars among the three brands heated up and reminded more men and couples about the medications. A few years ago, drug industry officials predicted erection medication sales of $4.5 billion a year by 2004. Actual sales in 2004 totaled $2.5 billion.
The only group showing more interest in erection medications is men under 55, not the group the drugs were developed to treat.
Overall, weekly prescriptions of erection drugs in the U.S. dropped from 350,000 prescriptions a week in 2004 to 320,000 in the year just ended. Viagra took the biggest hit, with sales dropping about 35 percent from 270,000 prescriptions a week to 200,000. Cialis sales doubled, from 40,000 to 80,000 prescriptions a week. And Levitra sales remained about the same at about 40,000 prescriptions a week.
Some of the decline may be due to the recent discovery that in rare cases, the drugs cause blindness. The Food and Drug Administration has ruled that warnings about this possibility be included on the drug label. But this side effect has not been well publicized, so it's unlikely that many men stopped using the drugs because of it.
According to a recent report in the New York Times, the vast majority of the sales decline is due to the fact that men who have taken the drugs have decided not to refill their prescriptions. The novelty seems to have worn off. Now millions of men have tried Viagra (or Cialis or Levitra), and many find that although erection medication helps in 70 percent of cases of impairment caused by poor blood flow into the penis, the improvement just isn't enough to persuade men to return to their doctors for prescription refills.
Another reason for the decline in erection medication sales is that many men mistakenly believed that the drugs are aphrodisiacs, that is, spurs to sexual desire. They are not. They simply increase blood flow into the penis when the man is sexually stimulated. They have no effect on sexual desire. As a result, some men expecting greater desire have felt disappointed in erection drugs and have stopped using them.
Another reason for the sales decline appears to be disappointing results among men under 40. In the vast majority of these men, drug-related increases in blood flow into the penis are barely noticeable.
During the years shortly after Viagra's approval, some pundits also suggested that men under 40 were flocking to erection medication as a recreational drug, so they could raise new erections shortly after ejaculating. Now it appears claims of recreational use have been exaggerated.
Finally, erection medication does nothing to alleviate a key cause of erection impairment, diabetes. Among diabetes' many effects on the body, two are sexual, nerve damage and increased risk of narrowed arteries. While erection drugs can help more blood flow through damaged arteries to the penis, if a man has diabetic nerve damage, he may be neurologically incapable of full erection-even with additional blood flow.
Currently, the typical user of erection medication is a married man age 55 to 69 who would like to have sex with his wife a few times a month. Drug industry surveys suggest that most of these men are content with that frequency, and have no desire to use erection medications to greatly increase it.
While Viagra, Cialis, and Levitra can increase the quality of erections, beyond that, they don't do much for the quality of lovemaking. Quality lovemaking, sex experts agree, has less to do with a rock-hard penis, and more to do with extended kissing and hugging, and leisurely, playful, whole-body massage that includes the genitals, but is not fixated on them. That's why Xandria offers so many sensual massage products, and encourages vibrators to be used not just between the legs, but all over the body. Every square inch of skin surface can be sensually aroused. For both men and women, when arousal is distributed over the whole body, genital fondling feels more erotic, and orgasms feel more intense. Lovers who understand this can enjoy fulfilling sex even if the man's erections are not what they used to be thirty years ago. For lovers interested in experimenting with more sensual sex, try Xandria's massage products, or for the more adventurous, perhaps some light BDSM toys.
Doctors are now writing 17 million prescriptions a year for erection drugs for about 5 million men. This compares with 40 million annual prescriptions for osteoporosis medication, and 100 million a year for antidepressants. Pfizer says it plans to increase Viagra advertising, so expect to see more commercials urging men to "make the call" to their doctors. But with sales of erection medication falling, it's not clear how many will-or should.