Pubdate: Sat, 18 Jul 1998 Source: San Francisco Examiner (CA) Contact: Website: http://www.examiner.com/ Author: Robert Salladay Examiner Capitol Bureau PRESCRIBING VIAGRA FOR SEX OFFENDERS MAY BECOME ILLEGAL Assembly bill targets sex-enhancing drugs SACRAMENTO -- A conservative Central Valley lawmaker wants to make it tough for sex offenders to buy Viagra and other sex-enhancing drugs. Assemblyman Robert Prenter, R-Hanford, said Friday he will introduce legislation to outlaw prescriptions of the popular anti-impotency pill to registered sex offenders in California. "Obviously, empowering known sex offenders to be able to repeat their crimes is of great concern," Prenter said. "It would be even more outrageous if it occurred at taxpayers' expense." Prenter said he was reacting to a report that a doctor at the Fresno Veterans Affairs Medical Center prescribed Viagra to a patient whom the doctor knew was a sex offender. Under a draft of Prenter's bill, any doctor who prescribes Viagra to someone they know is a registered sex offender could face up to a year in jail and be fined up to $20,000. The measure applies to any drug marketed to enhance sexual performance. The bill does not make it a crime for a sex offender to possess Viagra, but "that may be something we would look at in the future," Prenter said. "There is great concern that some sex offenders stop because they are impotent and this allows them to be sexually abusive again." Prenter has written the state Department of Mental Health and the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs asking them to clarify their policy on prescribing Viagra. Prenter said he began writing the bill in May, after hearing about the alleged incident in Fresno. The incident was reported by the Fresno media this week, but the names of the doctor and patient were not released. A spokesman for the Fresno VA hospital said the hospital has never allowed doctors to prescribe the drug on the premises and the pharmacy does not distribute it. All doctors, however, are free to prescribe any drug they see fit outside of work. "We don't know where that story is coming from," hospital spokesman David Phillips said of news accounts this week. In the past three months, doctors nationwide have written more than 2 million Viagra prescriptions. Caught off guard by the tremendous demand for the drug, insurance companies and hospitals have been scrambling to figure out whether to cover the costs for patients. A national panel at the VA is evaluating the drug's safety and writing guidelines covering whether to prescribe the drug to sex offenders. Most VA hospitals have declined to distribute the drug until the guidelines are completed. "We expect the policy within a few months," said Joe Barison, a spokesman at the VA's regional headquarters in Los Angeles. In Fresno, some doctors expressed concern about having to ask patients about their criminal history. "I think that kind of check-off list in a routine private urologic practice might, in fact, hamper a patient-doctor relationship," Dr. William Schiff told the Fresno Bee recently. California already requires chemical castration for repeat child molesters. 1998 San Francisco Examiner - --- Checked-by: Melodi Cornett