Panel kills bill requiring waiting period, counseling for men seeking erectile-dysfunction drugs

This undated photo provided by pfizer shows a real Viagra pill on top of counterfeit pills. In a first for the drug industry, Pfizer Inc. told The Associated Press on May 6, 2013, that it will sell erectile dysfunction pill Viagra directly to patients on its website.
This undated photo provided by pfizer shows a real Viagra pill on top of counterfeit pills. In a first for the drug industry, Pfizer Inc. told The Associated Press on May 6, 2013, that it will sell erectile dysfunction pill Viagra directly to patients on its website.

NASHVILLE - A House bill failed today that sought to impose a 48-hour waiting period, a stress test, counseling sessions and a partner's affidavit for men seeking erectile-dysfunction drug prescriptions to improve their sexual performance.

The male-dominated, Republican-controlled Health Subcommittee shot down Rep. Sherry Jones' bill on a voice vote.

"We want them to know what they're getting into because we want to try to help protect men," Jones, D-Nashville, earlier told the panel, which includes two male doctors.

Jones is a staunch defender of women's abortion rights and has fought new restrictions passed by lawmaker governing the procedure.

She described how a man recently came by her office with "a death certificate of his father's and the cause of his father's death was cardiac arrest immediately after taking Viagra."

The son himself was provided a drug for erectile dysfunction from a physician despite the son being on chemotherapy for cancer, Jones said.

Drugs dealing with erectile dysfunction are dangerous, Jones said, noting figures show 522 men died the first year that doctors began prescribing Viagra. She then went on to cite a lengthy list of serious side effects from such drugs, including heart attacks, blood clots and rectal hemorrhaging.

"This bill requires a heart stress test, affidavit from a partner that they do need the drugs," Jones said. "The physician will be required to give the patient, in writing, a list of complication that can occur and to wait 48 hours before filling that prescription so they can be totally aware of what's going on," she said.

It also "requires a doctor visit and out-patient counseling for three session because we want to be sure men understand the side effects of those," Jones added.

She described in minute detail what can happen to men with a four-hour or longer erection and medical procedures to address the situation.

Moreover, the lawmaker said, "if we don't want to pay for children, for a baby after its' born, if we don't want to provide services and benefits. if we don't want to teach sex education and only want to teach abstinence, if we don't want unintended pregnancies, then we don't need to run ads on television all day and night advertising erectile dysfunction medications and encouraging sex for men instead of abstinence.

"And," Jones added, "also include the responsibility for that man to care for that baby once it's created through use of dangerous drugs."

Rep. Matthew Hill, R-Jonesborough, invited Dr. John Hale, president of the Tennessee Medicial Association, to address the panel.

Hale said TMA members "are opposed to this bill" and noted he and other physicians prescribing drugs like Viagra and Cialis first take patients' conditions into account.

But, Hale said, "there's no way you can do stress tests on everyone who comes in for these things I understand there's a problem with it but you'd make a lot of constituents very upset" if the bill were to pass.

Rep. John Ray Clemmons, D-Nashville, questioned why the TMA did not speak out against a number of abortion-related bills.

Upcoming Events