A BusinessWeek story about soaring sales of testosterone aroused my attention this weekend. (OK, I admit that was an obvious pun.)

Once again, drug companies that make products meant for an aging population seeking to hold onto their youth, can thank baby boomers, mostly but not all men, who want to increase their libidos and general energy levels through use of the male hormone.

But not all drugs meant to stave off the ravages of time are doing as well as testosterone. Sales of the hormone rose 25 percent in the 12 months ending in June, BusinessWeek reports.

By contrast, the magazine reports that Viagra sales have been hurt by the recession, falling by 8 percent in the most recent quarter, the magazine says.

Some of this growth in testosterone sales could slow because of an action the Food and Drug Administration took earlier this year.

As the magazine reports, (and the NPR Health blog reported last May, the makers of testosterone gels have been required by the FDA to include a dreaded (by drug companies) "black box" warning. The reason: the gels could rub off on children and cause temporary changes like a transient puberty bout or aggressiveness.

Then again, testosterone seems to work wonders for some people.

 

Back in 2000, the late writer George Plimpton spoke with Juan Williams who was hosting Talk of The Nation to discuss a piece he wrote for Men's Journal titled "A Little Dab Will Do You" about his sampling of the testosterone gel.

While Plimpton acknowledged that the improvements could have been all in his mind, he sure seemed to have more pep.

An excerpt:

MR. PLIMPTON: And it was interesting to me. There is a thing called the placebo effect, which means that no matter what the gel is, or what—the thing you take for insomnia could be soda water and a little bit of apple juice in there, and you take it and you think, wow, and in fact there's nothing there at all—the so-called placebo effect. And I must say that having put this stuff on—and you do it daily, in the morning—I did begin to feel a bit energized.

It so happened that I was going out to California to the Los Angeles Book Fair jackknifed into a tourist seat. And I got out there, and, of course, it's quite exhausting, that trip. And you arrive there with hours to spend—it's 3:00 in the morning there, and, of course, it's only noon—3:00 in the afternoon is only noon. And I found myself able to give two speeches at the book fair; I kept remembering things I hadn't thought of in years. I started a booth and sold copies of my literary magazine with great energy and eclat, and I kept thinking to myself, my Lord, this stuff really works.

And not only that, but the coincidence was that I was invited to Mr. Hefner's mansion that afternoon to watch the Lennox Lewis-Michael Grant prize fight. And he was having a disco party afterwards. The place was full of extraordinarily pretty girls. And I found my energy in that department increased by—I began to think, this is really quite a miracle thing going on.
Now I have no idea whether it was the gel. This is only three days after I started taking it, so I suspect that the placebo effect was indeed in order.

WILLIAMS: Well, the presence of pretty girls at Hugh Hefner's place might—that might be enough of an impact to pep you up, you know?

Mr. PLIMPTON: Well, they are, but not to the degree that I seemed to be pepped up that evening. I mean, I didn't go amok in there or anything like that. I just—I think that when one tries something that is supposed to improve one's nature in any way that you tend to feel that it's working. So I—and then, of course, as the weeks went on, I didn't think about it quite as much, but it did seem to me to have an effect in—and I found myself playing better tennis. Again, it may be because of the placebo effect.

If this is the kind of word-of-mouth testosterone is getting from its users today, small wonder its sales are so strong.