For once pain and pleasure may go together

The world is full of strange and wonderful sights and sounds. Some people wander from place to place as idle tourists, spectators in search of novelty. Others come to study and learn. Over the last year or so, Brazil has become a beacon, drawing people for a wide range of reasons including the pleasures of Rio de Janeiro as the possible venue for the Olympics and the mysteries of the Amazon Basin, continuously immortalized in novels and the movies showing instant death lurking at every turn from wild tribes of headhunters and ferocious animals.

Now that Rio has been selected as the venue for the Olympics, it’s time to unveil the other reason for traveling through South America. Even in cities, there’s a chance of meeting Phoneutria nigriventer, the so-called wandering spider most commonly found in Brazil. Now, let’s be clear. There are many different varieties of poisonous animals and insects around the world and, unless you’re an expert, it’s probably never a pleasure to meet any of them face-to-fang. Yet, the case of the wandering spider does have interesting possibilities. It seems the bite injects a toxin that causes a long-lasting erection. Although this may seem a not unappealing consequence, the erection may be painful and, if the bite is not treated, you can die. But it could be one of the more interesting ways to die. It’s not clear whether there have been any medical tourists looking for an immediate cure for their erectile dysfunction.

In any event, researchers have extracted the venom and have been injecting it into rats. The results have shown a significant increase in the production of nitric oxide in the blood stream which triggers the dilation of arteries and, as a side effect, the creation of erections — lucky rats. Drug companies are therefore interested in the clinical findings both as a treatment of high blood pressure and the relief of erectile dysfunction in humans. So, instead of having to travel to Brazil in the hope of being bitten by a spider, your erectile dysfunction could be cured by swallowing a pill containing an extract from its venom.

While the world waits patiently for the drug companies to complete their trials and bring this new product to the market, men have to rely on cialis which, so far, has proved the best of the drugs to treat erectile dysfunction. Although the chemistry of the spider venom and cialis is completely different, they both produce long-lasting erections. Indeed, cialis is famous (or should that be “notorious”?) as the weekend pill because, over thirty-six hours, it enables men to produce erections as a response to sexual stimulation. Whether spider venom will have the same staying power is not yet known but, at present, no other drug on the market comes close to matching cialis. Alternatively, there’s a once-daily version of the drug that allows natural responses to stimulation 24/7. So, with the price the same for both versions of cialis, it’s up to the individual to decide whether the opportunity for sex is limited or open-ended, and buy accordingly.