Health Buzz: This Small Irish Town Has a Lot to Say About Viagra, Report Says

There's a town in Ireland that's home to a Pfizer factory, and its denizens claim that "Viagra is in the air."

So when word spread that erectile dysfunction drug Viagra was going to be available over-the-counter in Britain, the reaction was more of "amusement" in the town of Ringaskiddy, reports The Sunday Times. Pfizer has produced the drug for some time.

"One whiff and you're stiff," Debbie O'Grady told the Sunday Times while serving a drink at the village's Ferry Boat Inn. Ringaskiddy, an old fishing village now described as a "modern deepwater ferryport" near Cork, is home to no more than a couple hundred people.

The production of the drug started in the town circa 1998, which led to some anecdotal recollection.

"There were women having babies all the time, there were babies everywhere," Rita Rimington, a nursing home carer, told The Sunday Times. "It's the last thing that dies in a man."
Another mused there must've been something in the water – literally.

"I think that Viagra must have got into the water supply," Fiona Toomey, who went back to the village after spending time in Albany, New York, told the Sunday Times. "I'm convinced that's what happened at the very beginning before they were so closely regulated."

A Pfizer spokeswoman cleared the air on this conundrum, so to speak, telling The Sunday Times the notion that "Viagra is in the air" is little more than an "amusing" myth.

"Our manufacturing processes have always been highly sophisticated as well as highly regulated," she told The Sunday Times.