A new inhaler-delivered love drug for women and men is threatening to do Viagra one better, putting anyone with dysfunction in the mood, US media reported on Friday.
Sex experts say the drug, known as PT-141 and which is in final trials before US Food and Drug Administration review, will be the boon to women with desire woes that Viagra has been for millions of impotent men.
"The bottom line is that women have been really shortchanged," said Laura Berman, author of The Passion Prescription: Ten Weeks to Your Best Sex -- Ever!"
"Hopefully, this will be another option for women with physiologically based sexual dysfunction," Berman said.
For now there is no pharmaceutical option for female dysfunction comparable to Viagra; women have largely been limited to seeking counseling or therapy.
New Jersey-based drugmaker Palatin Technologies expects it will take about three more years before the drug goes to market.
PT-141 is a copy of the hormone that stimulates the melanocyte-receptors in the brain that play a role in sexual arousal.
Unlike Viagra, which gets the blood flowing in men, it goes straight to work on the mind, in both sexes.
"It affects the central nervous system," Berman said. "It affects desire."
In lab trials, female rats exposed to PT-141 immediately began seeking out male rats for sex.
New York magazine reported that women who took part in trials within minutes felt a "tingling and a throbbing" along with "a strong desire to have sex."
Men told the magazine a snort made them feel "younger and more energetic" as well as eager for sex.
"You get this humming feeling," one man told the weekly. "You're ready to take your pants off and go."
Michael Perelman, a sexual-medicine adviser on the PT-141 trials, said: "Its not merely allowing a sexual response to take place more easily. It may be having an effect, literally, on how we think, and feel."
SEEKING CHANGE: A hospital worker said she did not vote in previous elections, but ‘now I can see that maybe my vote can change the system and the country’ Voting closed yesterday across the Solomon Islands in the south Pacific nation’s first general election since the government switched diplomatic allegiance from Taiwan to Beijing and struck a secret security pact that has raised fears of the Chinese navy gaining a foothold in the region. The Solomon Islands’ closer relationship with China and a troubled domestic economy weighed on voters’ minds as they cast their ballots. As many as 420,000 registered voters had their say across 50 national seats. For the first time, the national vote also coincided with elections for eight of the 10 local governments. Esther Maeluma cast her vote in the
Nearly half of China’s major cities are suffering “moderate to severe” levels of subsidence, putting millions of people at risk of flooding, especially as sea levels rise, according to a study of nationwide satellite data released yesterday. The authors of the paper, published by the journal Science, found that 45 percent of China’s urban land was sinking faster than 3mm per year, with 16 percent at more than 10mm per year, driven not only by declining water tables, but also the sheer weight of the built environment. With China’s urban population already in excess of 900 million people, “even a small portion
UNSETTLING IMAGES: The scene took place in front of TV crews covering the Trump trial, with a CNN anchor calling it an ‘emotional and unbelievably disturbing moment’ A man who doused himself in an accelerant and set himself on fire outside the courthouse where former US president Donald Trump is on trial has died, police said yesterday. The New York City Police Department (NYPD) said the man was declared dead by staff at an area hospital. The man was in Collect Pond Park at about 1:30pm on Friday when he took out pamphlets espousing conspiracy theories, tossed them around, then doused himself in an accelerant and set himself on fire, officials and witnesses said. A large number of police officers were nearby when it happened. Some officers and bystanders rushed
HYPOCRISY? The Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs yesterday asked whether Biden was talking about China or the US when he used the word ‘xenophobic’ US President Joe Biden on Wednesday called for a hike in steel tariffs on China, accusing Beijing of cheating as he spoke at a campaign event in Pennsylvania. Biden accused China of xenophobia, too, in a speech to union members in Pittsburgh. “They’re not competing, they’re cheating. They’re cheating and we’ve seen the damage here in America,” Biden said. Chinese steel companies “don’t need to worry about making a profit because the Chinese government is subsidizing them so heavily,” he said. Biden said he had called for the US Trade Representative to triple the tariff rates for Chinese steel and aluminum if Beijing was