Leading article: Sexual revolution

"Love is the answer," said Woody Allen, "but while you're waiting for the answer, sex raises some pretty interesting questions." Indeed. And in that particular field, few subjects have inspired quite so much inquiry as the female orgasm. Some of the greatest male minds, from Sigmund Freud to Billy Chrystal, have wrestled with the subject. Does it exist? What is its evolutionary purpose? Can it be faked?

And now it is claimed that men in white lab coats have come up with an answer to some of these mysteries in the convenient form of a small pill. Fibanserin is being trumpeted as the "female Viagra".

So does this represent a welcome advance in gender equality, or the latest attempt by the pharmaceutical industry to get us all, male and female alike, dependent on its products? The answer is moot. But one suspects that if Fibanserin really does what it says on the tin, they are not going to be short of customers.