VIAGRA MAY ASSIST ENDANGERED SPECIES

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Endangered species may get a boost from Viagra

Report suggests Asian men may use blue pills over traditional wildlife-based

remedies

 

By DOUG O'HARRA

Anchorage Daily News

 

Published: October 12, 2005

Last Modified: October 12, 2005 at 07:14 AM

 

 

Asian men who traditionally tried to treat their impotence with sliced reindeer

antlers as well as bits of exotic and threatened animals may be switching to

Viagra, according to a study co-authored by a University of Alaska Anchorage

biologist.

 

 

The report, which has drawn international attention, found that a group of Hong

Kong men gave up traditional Chinese remedies like seal penises, sea horses and

green turtle eggs as a cure for erectile dysfunction in favor of more dramatic

and verifiable results produced by the little blue pills, said associate

professor Frank von Hippel.

 

In other words, Viagra may help save a few endangered critters from extinction,

as well as boost the flagging sex lives of middle-aged men.

 

A possible Alaska consequence cited by the scientists is the recent plunge in

the price of reindeer antlers, a legal animal product once in high demand as one

traditional treatment for male sexual problems.

 

" It's complicated, " von Hippel said. " It's hard to tease what part of the

decline in their trade is due to Viagra and due to other factors. "

 

Viagra won't have an impact on a different Alaska trade -- the illegal

trafficking in bear gall bladders, von Hippel said. Bear parts are thought to

increase sexual vigor by some Asian men but aren't considered a traditional

remedy specifically for erectile dysfunction, he said.

 

The study furthers a line of research that von Hippel and his brother, William,

a social psychologist at University of New South Wales in Australia, have

pursued since the 1998 introduction of Viagra.

 

Von Hippel said he was taken aback by the most recent media uproar -- which

broke Monday in Australia, spread to Europe overnight and was exciting U.S.

journalists on Tuesday.

 

By that afternoon, the two East High School graduates had fielded about 15

interviews from around the world.

 

" It's actually the same thing that happened the last two times we wrote about

this, " von Hippel said. " A lot of the research I do is a lot more important than

this, but I guess it has the appeal to the public because it has to do with sex

and drugs. "

 

Von Hippel, a conservation biologist, mostly studies the role of three-spine

sticklebacks as ecological indicators. William von Hippel specializes in aging

and prejudice.

 

" It has been perplexing, " said Frank von Hippel, in a telephone interview from

his office on the UAA campus.

 

The von Hippels decided to investigate whether Viagra's popularity cut the

demand for illegal animal parts while they were taking a hike near Campbell

Airstrip. After publishing articles in the journals Nature and Environmental

Conservation, they obtained a $46,000 grant for further work from Viagra

producer Pfizer Inc.

 

The study, published by Environmental Conservation, focused on 256 Chinese men

seeking traditional treatment for a range of maladies at a large Hong Kong

clinic. Co-author Norman Chan, a native Cantonese speaker and psychology

graduate student at the University of New South Wales, interviewed the men in

January 2004.

 

Of more than 30 men who had tried traditional Chinese remedies for impotence, at

least eight had switched to Viagra. Of 16 men who were using Viagra, none had

switched to traditional animal cures.

 

But most of the men continued to prefer traditional Chinese cures for arthritis,

indigestion and gout -- and used western medicine at a much lower rate.

 

That makes sense, von Hippel said, because many Chinese men remain deeply

suspicious of western medicine and wouldn't make the cross-cultural switch

unless they had a very good reason.

 

And that would be penile dysfunction.

 

Traditional Chinese medicine encompasses myriad animal and plant cures, some

proven to be effective and some not, von Hippel said. No one has found any

evidence that antlers, penises or other animal parts cure impotence. Those

skeptical of traditional cures contend they could work by the power of

suggestion, von Hippel said.

 

" It's a unique kind of ailment in that the problem is incredibly important to

the quality of life to men, and the new western remedies work right away and

it's obvious that it works, " von Hippel said.

 

The authors next argued that switching to Viagra and other modern medicines for

impotence has begun to reduce the number of threatened and endangered animals

killed in the quest for remedies.

 

Besides antlers, traditional cures often used seal and sea lion penises -- taken

legally from Canadian harp and hooded seals and poached from species off the

Galapagos Islands and southern Africa. Other species included are sea horses,

sea cucumbers and green sea turtles.

 

Conservationists have been skeptical that Viagra will really make a difference.

A spokesman for the World Wildlife Fund's Traffic program told Nature that

endangered species get used for many ailments besides impotence. " Viagra really

clouds the discussion of species conservation, " said Gus Sant.

 

Whether Viagra has affected legal sale of Alaska reindeer antlers is also

difficult to sort out, said Rose Fosdik, with the Kawerak Reindeer Herders

Association in Nome. Antlers are also used as traditional cures for several

conditions.

 

The value of Alaska reindeer byproducts, including antlers, dropped from about

$692,000 in 1997 to $195,000 in 1998, the year Viagra was introduced. The sales

have remained about the same ever since, according to Alaska Agricultural

Statistics Service.

 

Prices have been half of the $40 to $45 per pound that antlers used to bring,

several herders said.

 

" I think it has something to do with Viagra, " said a herder with the reindeer

operation on Nunivak Island.

 

 

Daily News reporter Doug O'Harra can be reached at do'harra.