Inside a pharmacy that overlooks the Liberty Street in Tunis, I deliberately raised my voice while asking the pharmacist who was busy explaining a prescription to a customer who seemed in a hurry, “I want a pack of Viagra.” Before I finished the sentence I was gazing at the faces of the costumers who filled the place in the evening of that day. Signs of astonishment and embarrassment appeared on their faces, clearly denouncing what I asked for. A fat woman standing in front of me ducked and muttered: “No longer is there shame in this country.”

Inside a pharmacy that overlooks the Liberty Street in Tunis, I deliberately raised my voice while asking the pharmacist who was busy explaining a prescription to a customer who seemed in a hurry, “I want a pack of Viagra.” Before I finished the sentence I was gazing at the faces of the costumers who filled the place in the evening of that day. Signs of astonishment and embarrassment appeared on their faces, clearly denouncing what I asked for. A fat woman standing in front of me ducked and muttered: “No longer is there shame in this country.”

The pharmacist seemed shocked and shook his head in a vague way suggesting his disapproval of my request which apparently embarrassed him in front of his customers. “We do not sell Viagra,” said the pharmacist sharply, conclusively and angrily as his only way out of this impasse and as if he had been denying the charge of selling Viagra.

The blue dream has come true after 13 years

On the September 4, 2012, Pfizer Tunisia, a branch of Pfizer – the world’s largest research-based pharmaceutical company – announced that it officially managed to get permission to distribute and market Viagra in Tunisian pharmacies after it waited more than 13 years for the Tunisian government’s response regarding the file submitted on November 6, 1998.

I left the pharmacy whose owner refused to admit that he sold Viagra, even though this drug was officially licensed. I went to another pharmacy in the Olympic neighborhood, which is adjacent to the capital.

Although the pharmacist welcomed me warmly, she became quickly astonished and tried to hide her sarcastic grin when I said definitively: “I want a pack of Viagra.”

“The prescription, please!” she said and quickly added “Which size?” I deliberately ignored her request regarding the prescription since I did not have one and I asked her to explain in greater detail, “Are there different sizes?” I asked her.

She shook her head and explained: “There is a pack with 25 mg and four blue pills for 17.80 Dinars(US $11.50), a pack with 50 mg and four blue pills at 20.255  Dinars (US $13) and a pack of 100 mg and also four blue pills at 23.775 Dinars (US $15.38).”

“I want a small pack,” I replied and added in a deliberately indifferent tone while opening my handbag, “Is there a great demand for this drug by Tunisians?”

“Sort of,” she replied smiling, “especially since Viagra has officially come on the market only a few months ago. It’s usually men who buy the drug. Anyway, there’s no Viagra for women,” she added in a sarcastic tone.

Record demand

I tried to contact Tunisia’s Pfizer Director-General, but he was on a mission abroad. When asked whether or not Viagra marketing was successful in Tunisia around five months after the beginning of its official marketing, one of his assistants said that Viagra was regularly sold and there were enough supplies to meet a great demand; more than 25,000 pills were sold as of September.

Official reports by Pfizer say more than 2.8 billion pills have been sold all over the world at a rate of six pills per second. The drug has also treated 41 million cases and there have been 311 Viagra prescriptions.

The vast majority of the public believe that Viagra is an aphrodisiac, while doctors deem it a drug like all other medicines and recommend that a physician be consulted before using it as it may cause disorders in vital organs, including cardiac arrest.

According to a source of the Tunisian Ministry of Health, no deaths due to cardiac arrest resulting from Viagra have taken place in Tunisia so far.

Sexual dysfunction

In many of its medical conferences, the Tunisian Association of Sexual Researches and Sexual Dysfunction called upon the need to introduce Viagra to the Tunisian market after studies showed that 40% of Tunisians suffered from a sexual dysfunction, according to a study published in Assabah newspaper, and needed this drug, especially since some of them had used counterfeit and smuggled Viagra.

It is worth mentioning that Viagra is one of the most counterfeit drugs in the world where the counterfeit pills contain unknown substances that may cause allergic reactions or serious complications that might be fatal.

While Tunisians’ positions regarding the “blue pill” varied when it was banned, it has become one of the country’s most popular goods. The supplies provided by the Central Pharmacy have run out within only a few months. Some attribute this to the spread of common-law marriage where statistics report 700-800 common-law marriages in Tunisian universities with a rate of 80% among salafist students.

One young man said about Viagra: “Thank God, the revolution goals have been realized; a blue pill and four women. We no longer need the Constituent Assembly thanks to the current officials.”