Monthly Viagra ration perks up Eurocrats
Andrew Osborn, Brussels
Friday August 9, 2002
HYPERLINK "http://www.guardian.co.uk/"The Guardian
The long list of perks enjoyed by Eurocrats is already the stuff of legend: outrageously low tax rates, chauffeur-driven BMWs, three-hour lunch breaks and, for MEPs, their own in-office showers.
But to the undoubted horror and bemusement of Eurosceptics, the officials in Brussels everyone loves to hate have just been given another "fringe benefit" to perk them up: a cut-price monthly ration of Viagra.
"We can claim for Viagra but only for so much," a spokesman from the European commission conceded yesterday. "However, I haven't felt the need to claim any myself."
But for those officials from the commission, the EU's council of ministers and the European parliament who do suffer from erectile dysfunction, financial help is at hand.
Frustrated male Eurocrats may have had to suffer the indignity of dipping into their own wage packets to purchase the blue anti-impotence pill, but the EU institutions' in-house medical insurer has now agreed to reimburse the cost of six pills a month, to the tune of 85%. That amounts to a Viagra allowance of around £35 a month for each official or MEP (each pill costs between £6.50 and £7).
It is not known how many Eurocrats will take advantage of this perk, although the EU's social security fund, which dates back to the 1950s, has 85,000 beneficiaries and 45,000 active contributors.
In Europe an estimated 36m men suffer from erectile dysfunction.
EU officials are well used to fending off accusations of privilege and so it was that when a manager responsible for the Viagra scheme was asked by the French daily Le Monde if the monthly allowance amounted to a new perk the answer was a resounding "non".
"Absolutely not," the official insisted. "We're only reimbursing people for six pills a month and under draconian conditions." Impotence, he added, needed to be a direct consequence of a serious illness.
Controversy over the issue is unlikely to be a laughing matter. The fact that Viagra is now being supplied to EU officials at a fraction of its cost is likely to whip up Eurosceptics into a new frenzy - especially since two-thirds of the EU's social security fund is made up of contributions from the European taxpayer.
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