The drug has been connected to male infertility

Feb 25, 2008 19:06 GMT  ·  By

Pump it into your body, if erections is what you want, but the miracle pill is not that clean. All impotence drugs traded as Cialis (tadalafil), Levitra (vardenadil), and Viagra (sildenafil) use the same mechanism to induce and maintain an erection. They inactivate the PDE5 enzyme that breaks down cyclic GMP.

Studies show that these chemicals damage the inner ear and hearing loss has already been reported in some subjects in clinical trials, sometimes in just two days of drug consumption.

A new study published in the journal Fertility and Sterility warns about another issue: Viagra may mean sex and ... nothing more. The "love pill" means no children: it harms the sperm, destroying its ability to fertilize an ovule. It appears that fertility clinics prescribing Viagra to men (about 40 %) in fact further decrease their chances of becoming fathers.

"It is worrying that some IVF clinics are using Viagra in order to boost fertility results. Couples who go there for treatment are, by definition, already having problems getting pregnant. Viagra may simply be making these worse. Giving male partners something that could make the problem worse is scarcely the right approach," said gynecologist Dr David Glenn.

When his research team exposed human sperm cells in a Viagra solution having the same concentration as that occurring in the blood of a man after taking just one pill, the researchers discovered that Viagra turned sperm cells less active; moreover, these cells had damaged acrosomes (the chemical-filled cap-like structures that enable the sperm to break into an ovule).

When sperm exposed to Viagra was tested in the case of lab mice, it appeared that those rodents produced 40 % less embryos. Viagra was launched in 1998, and so far over 20 million men has taken it as a prescription. The majority may be middle aged or elderly, less interested in having more children, "but younger men using it recreationally could have fertility problems later," warned Glenn.