Be careful of kill-me-quick Blue pills

Just why are young virile men popping the blue pill to get the action going on at Emirates stadium?

A Kenyan man was this week arrested at the Jomo Kenyatta International Airport with 440,000 libido-boosting tablets valued at Sh44 million, meaning there is a ready-made market.

Labelled Vega 100, the tablets – imported from India – have the same shape, form and colour of the famous Viagra.

 It was no coincidence that the name rhymed and functionality matched.

The man told the police that he intended to sell the tablets at Sh100 each in the black market where the demand is supposedly high.

Blocked blood vessels

While the man’s motives are quite discernible, not so many are asking why he would bring that much sex enhancing medication   into a population that has relatively lived devoid of sexual dysfunction.

“Viagra contains chemicals which open up blocked blood vessels, allowing blood to flow through into the sex organ of a man so that they can function,” says Dr Richard Muraga of Family Health Options.

 “However, such medicine should only be used under a doctor’s prescription after a patient has been assessed and declared safe to use the enhancing drugs.”

Muraga is apprehensive of the black market where sex enhancing medicine and gadgets are sold in Nairobi.

He fears that deaths and severe damages can occur to those who seek to use illegal sex enhancing drugs that haven’t been approved by Kenya’s Pharmacy and poisons Board.

“In fact, I would advice Kenyans to be very weary of shops and outlets which purport to sell medicine that is meant for sex enhancement,” says Muraga.

Last year, America’s Food and Drug Administration issued a health advisory warning consumers not to purchase or use certain male enhancement products carrying hidden ingredients that could be dangerous.

Investigators from the consumer protection unit conducted laboratory analyses, which found that the drugs contained sildenafil, the active ingredient in the FDA-approved prescription drug Viagra, and similar medications used to treat erectile dysfunction.

According to the body, sildenafil may interact with nitrates found in some prescription drugs, such as nitroglycerin, leading to dangerously lowered blood pressure.

In fact, FDA postulated that men with diabetes, high blood pressure, high cholesterol, or heart disease often use medicine with nitrates – putting them on a coalition course with danger.

Muraga offers that even though sex-enhancing medicine can be used under prescription, they still bear side effects that patients have to be told clearly before they are allowed to use.

 Because of their mechanism of action, sex enhancing drugs like Viagra can cause death even during sex.

For those that haven’t been approved, Muraga opines that the dangers they carry could be much worse.