Pfizer Sued by AIDS Treatment Group for Selling Sex

The AIDS Healthcare Foundation (AHF) told Reuters news service that it is planning to file a lawsuit against Pfizer in order to bar the company from continuing to promote Viagra as a sexual enhancement drug. AHF says that Pfizer has been marketing its blockbuster impotence pill as a lifestyle improvement, rather than a treatment for a health care problem. AHF says that the company’s marketing approach has encouraged men to engage in risky behavior, and has had a direct impact on the increase in HIV and other sexually transmitted diseases.

In its legal documents, AHF cites several Viagra marketing promotions that have been launched in recent years, such as a newspaper ad that was run just before the 2006 Super Bowl with a caption urging men to "Be This Sunday’s MVP" by asking their doctors about Viagra. Another ad in late 2005 showed a man with a sultry smile asking, "What are you doing New Year’s Eve?" As for Pfizer’s website for Viagra, it claims that the drug can offer help to men who have difficulty maintaining an erection "once in a while." The question the website asks visitors is "Want to improve your sex life?"

Michael Weinstein, the president of the non-profit AHF, said that the marketing approaches used by Pfizer make Viagra sound like a "party drug" intended to make sex more pleasurable for healthy men. He added that the Food and Drug Administration has not approved the company’s making such claims. He also pointed out that the men shown in Pfizer’s recent ads are much younger and more attractive than the first famous pitchman for Viagra, former Kansas Sen. Bob Dole, who is now 83.

"Bob Dole has been replaced by the hunky 40-something guy who looks like he can really have a good time," Weinstein told a reporter. "The message they are sending out is that any and every male should take it." AHF, which is based in California, oversees AIDS clinics in the United States, the Caribbean, Latin America, Africa and Asia that provide medical care and services to more than 53,000 people worldwide whether or not they are able to pay for treatment. The group has repeatedly complained to Pfizer about its ads, to no effect.

In 2004, the FDA complained to Pfizer about a television commercial that suggested Viagra could help a man return to the "wild thing" that he was when he was younger. The company stopped that campaign after the FDA said that it made an unproven claim that by taking Viagra, men could regain the level of sexual desire they had when they were younger.

Pfizer spokeswoman Shreva Prudlo told reporters that the company did not know AHF was planning to file suit. She said that the company "has always been committed to safe and appropriate use of Viagra" and that the label and marketing promotions for the drug clearly say that "Viagra does not protect against sexually transmitted diseases, including HIV."

However, studies show evidence of Viagra being used by men who have sex with men, sometimes as a method of lessening the effects of alcohol or street drugs such as ecstasy, which can inhibit the ability to maintain an erection. AHF says that "Pfizer has created and contributed to the perception of Viagra as a safe, sexy, lifestyle, recreational drug, to be frequently used regardless of the degree, or even existence of" erectile dysfunction.

Sales of Viagra reached over $1.6 billion worldwide in 2005. Sales slipped a little recently with the introduction of Cialis, a rival impotence medication, because Cialis can work for up to 26 hours, while Viagra works for about four hours. AHF’s suit will ask that Pfizer use profits gained from misleading advertising to pay AHF’s costs for treating AIDS and other illnesses linked to the use of Viagra.