A DRUG that gives fellas a lift in the bedroom may also beat Covid, experts believe.
Officials in the US have granted the £9.50 jab fast track approval after early signs of success.
It is still undergoing clinical trials but can already be used for emergency coronavirus cases.
Doctors at Houston Methodist Hospital say it helped one seriously ill man make a “rapid recovery”.
The patient, 54, developed Covid while being treated for rejection of a double lung transplant.
But he came off a ventilator within four days of treatment with RLF-100, or aviptadil.
More than 15 other critically ill patients are also said to have recovered from respiratory failure within three days of treatment.
The drug is used in the UK to treat erectile dysfunction. It is combined with phentolamine and injected into the privates.
Brazillian researchers found aviptadil stopped the coronovirus multiplying in human lung cells and immune cells in a lab.
Jonathan Javitt, from drug developer NeuroRx, said: “No other antiviral agent has demonstrated rapid recovery from viral infection and demonstrated laboratory inhibition of viral replication.” Medics are now awaiting the result of formal trials involving five US hospitals and 70 patients who are less sick.
Some have been given the real drug and others a placebo to see if there is a difference in outcomes.
It is hoped the drug will prevent the disease progressing when given at an earlier stage.
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