Britain's National Institute of Health to Ration Viagra

This is no joke.

Viagra is available privately, but the NHS is dogging those least able to pay for it out of pocket, the same people who are supposed to be better off with nationalization. Socialism sucks that way.

At Telegraph UK, "Viagra rationing to limit patients' sex lives":

With the Christmas holidays approaching fast, hard-working middle-aged couples could be forgiven for viewing the season of mistletoe and wine as a chance to spend a few cherished moments between the sheets.

But their amorous plans may be scuppered after penny-pinching NHS managers introduced new viagra prescription guidelines which could limit thousands of couples to having sex once a fortnight.

New policy documents advise GPs in parts of the country that patients in need of Viagra or similar drugs should be limited to two pills per month, down from the normal prescription of four.

Although the policy was described as a "recommendation" by NHS authorities, local medical committees told the GPs' magazine Pulse it was being handed down to family doctors as an "edict".

Erectile dysfunction medication is already stringently limited on the NHS and can only be prescribed to patients with certain conditions such as diabetes, multiple sclerosis and prostate cancer.

According to the NHS some 2.2 million prescriptions for erectile dysfunction drugs were issued last year, with 14.5 million tablets issued at a cost of about £78 million.

NHS guidance acknowledges that there "appears to be no clinical reason to restrict the number of tablets" but it adds that, according to research, the average person has sex four times a month.
It says: "The average frequency of sexual intercourse in the 40 to 60 age range is once a week."
The new policy is aimed at economising on non-essential treatments, recommending that the minimum effective dose be prescribed "two times per month using the drug with the lowest acquisition cost."

The guidance applies to sildenafil (Viagra), vardenafil (Levitra) and tadalafil (Cialis).

And this is the clincher:

Richard Hoey, editor of Pulse, said: "Ask most doctors and they will say that being able to live a satisfactory sex life is a key part of health and wellbeing, but the NHS has never recognised that in its policy on treatment for erectile dysfunction.

"Limiting patients to drugs like Viagra just twice a month is to treat sex like an unnecessary luxury, and completely fails to recognise the degree of anguish it can cause some men with erectile dysfunction."

Well, yeah.

Freakin' big government health bureaucrats. What losers.