The new Queen Levitra: Jerry Hall

I’ll admit it: This isn’t really a biotech posting. Sure, it involves Levitra, one of the big rival drugs to Cialis, which was developed by the biggest home-grown biotech in Bothell, ICOS Corp.

But the real reason I post it up here is because Levitra’s new spokeswoman is Jerry Hall — ex-wife of Rolling Stones’ frontman Mick Jagger — who is an outrageous interview subject. She utters one of the funniest quotes I’ve seen in a while in this story from the Winnipeg Sun, http://winnipegsun.com/News/Canada/2006/06/01/1609237-sun.html.

Here’s the key quote about why she prefers older men: “Yes. Sometimes there are difficulties, but there’s a pill for that. Younger men make you listen to Coldplay, and there’s no cure for that.” (Sorry, Coldplay fans.)

She goes on to say she still prefers listening to the Stones, and she says WAY more than I needed to know about her former husband’s vitality in this related story, http://www.edmontonsun.com/News/Canada/2006/06/01/1609310-sun.html. Hall apparently has been hired by Bayer HealthCare to be a spokeswoman for Levitra and for the bigger topic of ED awareness. The company’s campaign is launching in Canada this week, thus the press coverage.

By the way, according to the latest available figures from IMS Health, Levitra still trails both Cialis and Viagra by quite a margin. As of mid-May, 18 percent of first-time prescriptions for erectile dysfunction drugs were for Levitra, compared to 25.7 percent for Cialis and just under 55 percent for Viagra.