With the 30th anniversary of the initial approval of sildenafil rapidly approaching, there is an entire generation of people born in a world where erectile dysfunction is a men’s health condition that can be treated.
With cheap, affordable sildenafil now widely available to any man who needs it and the effects of the vasodilating medication having been comprehensively studied, doctors are better equippedthan ever before to know if ED medication will help and the expected effects.
However before all of this was the case, the medication was the subject of both curiosity and controversy when it was discussed, marketed or sold.
Possibly the most infamous case of this was a rather unusual test during a weekday morning chat show that was so controversial even the pharmaceutical company that manufactured it complained.
Mid-Morning Men’s Health
Ever since its launch in 1988, This Morning was a magazine show with a fairly light-hearted tone that discussed a wide variety of subjects from the mundane to the ridiculous.
Alongside conversations with the woman who could not stop eating her own armchair, a competition to find the most photogenic cow and an interview with a tree, This Morning became famous for its rather regular discussions about sexual health.
It was the first UK television show to broadcast someone having a testicular examination as well as a rectal exam, has frequently explored a wide range of sexual health conditions, featured a review of sex toys and frequently discussed ED medications, both for men and for women.
All of this was on a show which aired at 10:30 AM on a weekday.
However, one of the most groundbreaking and controversial examples took place on 16th September 1998, when Richard Madeley and Judy Finnigan hosted the first televised test of sildenafil in the United Kingdom.
Mixed Results, Mixed Reaction
So long ago was the test first aired that erectile dysfunction was still being described under the previous stigmatised name of impotence, but during a time when Viagra was not approved for
sale in the UK, Richard and Judy aimed to test how effectively it worked.
To that end, they invited three couples out of thousands of applicants to come to the This Morning studio in London to take the blue pill live on television, go to a nearby hotel with their partner and report on the effects.
The resulting interview at the end of the three-hour show showed that it had worked for all three couples but to different degrees.
One couple, Mr and Mrs Brown, described the effects working immediately to help relieve the symptoms of ED and expressed surprise that it activated far more quickly than they expected.
On the other hand, Mr and Mrs Gowdie noted only partial improvement whilst Mr and Mrs Witherington said it was the best treatment they had tried but found the experience rather uncomfortable given that they were not in their own home to try it.
Part of their discomfort was shaped by the test format; in a retrospective interview, Mrs Finnigan noted that there was a producer with a walkie-talkie “prowling” the hotel corridors providing updates, which was far from the ideal environment for a test of an ED medication.
This, if anything, provided greater credence to the efficacy of sildenafil, although the general public did not know about the problems with the testing until much later.
Controversial
The reception to the test proved to be polarising. Whilst some credited the segment with smashing a stigma surrounding sexual health, particularly men’s sexual health, as well as being a cutting-edge segment in general, a lot of the responses were perhaps unsurprisingly critical.
Some members of the audience naturally questioned if it was an appropriate subject for a morning television show, even with an expectation that children would be at school during its broadcast.
These complaints were even made in late 2024 when the show repeated the test with what it described as “female Viagra” according to The Mirror.
However, the biggest complaints came from Pfizer, the company that at the time was the exclusive manufacturer of sildenafil under the brand name Viagra.
They said that they were concerned not necessarily with the discussion of their product but that the approach the show took could be seen as trivialising a medical condition and sensationalising the suffering of the people who have it and their partners.
Ultimately, while it would be discussed as one of many incongruent segments to take place on This Morning over its decades-long history, it ultimately played a small role in the treatment of men’s health, raised awareness of a treatment just as it was becoming approved in the UK, and contributed to the modern treatment of ED.
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