FDA Issues Warning About Sex Pills After Man Falls Ill

The federal Food and Drug Administration is warning that a supposed aphrodisiac distributed by a Sherman Oaks company is suspected of having caused the seizures that stopped the heart of a Virginia man.

The capsules, which come in a box labeled “Spanish Fly Pills, Legendary Sex Exciter,” are distributed by a company listed on the box as Pleasure Products. The address given is a post office box in Sherman Oaks.

Pleasure Products has no telephone listing and it is not registered as a business name in California.

“We hope that anyone who has these in their possession will not consume them,” Betsy Adams, a spokeswoman for the FDA, said Sunday. The FDA is attempting to determine whether the Virginia man’s heart failure was caused by a dose of Spanish fly from Pleasure Products, she said.

The man who fell ill after taking one or more of the capsules is Jerry Daniel Atwood, 36, who purchased them while on vacation in Oshkosh, Wis., according to officials of the Oshkosh Police Department. “Our information was that the Spanish fly was bought in an adult store here when he was in town for the air show,” Oshkosh Police Lt. Tom Wilkinson said.

The air show, known as the Experimental Aircraft Assn. Fly-In Convention, is one of the nation’s most prominent. This year, it was held July 26 through Aug. 1.

“He didn’t take any of the pills until after he got home,” Wilkinson said. “On Aug. 19, at 7:30 p.m., his wife gave him one of them. By 8:30, he was having seizures and then his heart stopped. The paramedics got his heart going again and got him to the hospital.”

FDA officials said Atwood is now out of the hospital and is recovering at home.

The police in Oshkosh seized Spanish fly, which is illegal to sell, from several sex-oriented businesses in that city, including Supreme Video, which carried capsules distributed by Pleasure Products.

Wilkinson said it had not been determined if Atwood had bought the Spanish fly in that store. A clerk reached at Supreme Video would not comment.

Samples from the Oshkosh seizures have been delivered to the FDA for testing, Wilkinson said.

Spanish fly, long promoted as a sex-drive enhancement, is traditionally derived from a combination of dried bodies of beetles, zinc, estrogen and two poisons--strychnine and yohimbine, extracted from the bark of a west African tree. It comes in various forms, including capsules and liquid.

FDA studies have failed to confirm its supposed powers and in 1989, the agency banned its sale.

It is, however, widely available. Employees at several sex-oriented businesses contacted in the Los Angeles area said they sell Spanish fly, although none of them were familiar with the brand Pleasure Products.