The UK government last week issued draft guidance to doctors on when they could prescribe sildenafil citrate (Viagra) to patients on the NHS. Doctors' representatives immediately rejected the government's proposals as "cruel and unethical."

Frank Dobson, secretary of state for health, said that GPs could prescribe Viagra and other drug treatments for impotence only to patients who have undergone prostatectomy or radical pelvic surgery, or suffer from spinal cord injury, diabetes, multiple sclerosis, or single gene neurological disease.

The minister says that NHS treatment may also be available "in a hospital setting subject to specialist assessment in those exceptional circumstances where impotence is causing severe distress."  Doctors will be advised to restrict their prescribing of treatment for impotence to one treatment a week. Patients not suffering from one of the named conditions would be able to get a private prescription. The pills cost about £6 each. For full story click here

Department of Health press release

John Chisholm’s editorial (BMJ, 30 January 1999)

Interview with Professor Alan Johnson, chairman of Standing Medical Advisory Committee

Kamran Abbasi's review of media coverage of the issue

Tell us what you think about the government's decision

Rapid Responses:

Read all Rapid Responses

Freedom of choice.

Deric
bmj.com, 27 Jan 1999 [Full text]

The long road to viagra

Anonynous
bmj.com, 27 Jan 1999 [Full text]

Raw Nerve

Tom Hyde
bmj.com, 28 Jan 1999 [Full text]

Legality of private prescriptions for sildenafil for NHS patients

Peter English
bmj.com, 30 Jan 1999 [Full text]

Viagra and the wider debate

John Stapleton
bmj.com, 30 Jan 1999 [Full text]

Sildenafil over the counter

Charles West
bmj.com, 30 Jan 1999 [Full text]

Indications for Viagra

S Mittal
bmj.com, 1 Feb 1999 [Full text]

sense.

John Gregson
bmj.com, 2 Feb 1999 [Full text]

Disease Aetiology as a basis for rationing

Andrew Green
bmj.com, 2 Feb 1999 [Full text]

Re: Legality of private prescriptions for sildenafil for NHS patients

Adrian Midgley
bmj.com, 2 Feb 1999 [Full text]

Rationing is inevitable

M Sparks
bmj.com, 4 Feb 1999 [Full text]

Rationing wisely

S Shaffi
bmj.com, 4 Feb 1999 [Full text]

Recreational Drugs

Ron Law
bmj.com, 5 Feb 1999 [Full text]

Flabby logic

Stephen Senn
bmj.com, 7 Feb 1999 [Full text]

Keep your privates Private

Mark Norman
bmj.com, 8 Feb 1999 [Full text]

What is Fair?

Lewis Miller
bmj.com, 8 Feb 1999 [Full text]

Re: Re: Legality of private prescriptions for sildenafil for NHS patients

Charles Tricks
bmj.com, 9 Feb 1999 [Full text]

Viagra: more than just an issue of rationing

Colin Cutting
bmj.com, 9 Feb 1999 [Full text]

NO not Viagra

Ginger
bmj.com, 12 Feb 1999 [Full text]

Hope for the future

Stephen Dorman
bmj.com, 12 Feb 1999 [Full text]

A stiff response to Frank

David Hopkins
bmj.com, 13 Feb 1999 [Full text]

Private prescriptions on NHS premises

Gordon Caldwell
bmj.com, 15 Feb 1999 [Full text]

Viagra

R Beck
bmj.com, 15 Feb 1999 [Full text]

Rationing Pills, Rationing People

Peter West
bmj.com, 16 Feb 1999 [Full text]

Re: Flabby Logic

Miranda Kavanagh
bmj.com, 17 Feb 1999 [Full text]

Evidence of recreational Viagra (sidenafil) use in Britain

J Aldridge, et al.
bmj.com, 24 Feb 1999 [Full text]

Sexual dysfunction in MS patients on Betainterferon

R K Munjal
bmj.com, 23 Feb 1999 [Full text]

A case of Christian Charity

Tony Schembri
bmj.com, 26 Feb 1999 [Full text]

Recreational use of Viagra amongst gay men (sidenafil) in Britain

Sherena Cedar
bmj.com, 25 Feb 1999 [Full text]

Re: Evidence of recreational Viagra (sidenafil) use in Britain

Jon Doyle
bmj.com, 2 Mar 1999 [Full text]

viagra exhausts an impotent

Fazlur Rahman
bmj.com, 1 Oct 1999 [Full text]