It sounds so perfect: a libido-boosting pill for women that would magically erase all the cares, exhaustion and worries of the day and put her in the mood for sex. But while hopes ran high for a female version of Viagra, it appears that such a medication is not yet ready for prime time.
The Federal Food and Drug Administration's (FDA) advisory panel of health experts recently rejected a drug that would treat diminishing libido in women, saying that, in two studies, it did not increase sexual desire. And any benefits from the medication, made by Boehringer Ingelheim, simply did not outweigh the annoying, even disabling, side effects, the panel concluded.
Those side effects ranged from depression and fatigue to nausea and fainting spells--hardly conditions that a woman would be likely to put up with just to bump up sexual desire.
"I am convinced that women's sexual health is important and that many women suffer from sexual dysfunction, but I'm not convinced of a clinically meaningful benefit for this drug," one of the panelists, Paula Hillard, a Stanford University School of Medicine gynecologist, said, according to the Associated Press.
The drug, known as flibanserin, first under study as a medication for depression, works on brain chemicals such as serotonin. After women taking it reported that they had very high levels of sexual satisfaction, it was repackaged as a libido-boosting treatment. It was to have been sold under the brand name Girosa. Flibanserin is not approved for use anywhere in the world at this point.
While the studies noted a relatively modest increase in sexual satisfaction, the health experts on the FDA panel didn't think the gains were great enough to approve it as a daily treatment for women with low sexual desire.
The drug industry may keep trying to find a medicine that would make women eager for sex. Viagra, the erectile dysfunction drug to treat men that was launched in 1998, is enormously successful. The market to treat what is sometimes called "female sexual dysfunction" is estimated at $2 billion, according to the Associated Press.
Recognizing the huge potential market, Pfizer at one point tested Viagra on women. But that drug, which increases blood flow to the genitals, didn't work for women. Drugmakers met similar failure when they tested hormones like testosterone. The FDA panel declined to approve a testosterone patch called Intrinsa, made by Procter & Gamble, because of unknown risks of using it over time.
Though the FDA has not formally rejected flibanserin, it's expected to do so in the near future since the agency generally follows the advice of its panelists.
One perhaps insurmountable problem with creating a female version of Viagra is that in women, sexual desire is just much more complicated than it is in men. While guys who suffer from erectile dysfunction can find quick results with a medication that allows them to have an erection, women's sexual desire is much more influenced by factors like the quality of their relationship and their lifestyle. It just may be impossible to cook up a pill that would promote sexual desire in women.
