What U.S. Military Spends on Viagra to Help Veterans with PTSD

The military’s appetite for Viagra is a serious subject.

President Trump’s decision to ban transgender individuals from the military, which is now postponed, to avoid “tremendous” costs. The controversy drew attention to the fact that the military spends ten times more on erectile dysfunction medication than the expected health care costs for transgender service members.

At first, the fact seemed to highlight the irony of it all, but it belies the cost of treating the 257,000 veterans with PTSD, Quartz reports. Post traumatic stress commonly causes sexual dysfunction in both male and female vets. A 2002 study found 80 percent of troops with PTSD also experienced erectile dysfunction.

According to the Military Times, the Department of Defense spends $84 million per year on Viagra, Cialis, Levitra and similar medications. In 2014, 1.18 million prescriptions for were filled out for meds treating erectile dysfunction, a common PTSD symptom.

When it was first made available to service members in 1998, Viagra cost $10 per dose. Today, its $25 and limited to six a month.

Quartz reports that soldiers say the erectile dysfunction medication helps them with recovery process—even if they were embarrassed to admit it.