It's true. There is such a thing as a penis bone: "Whatever men and smirking wives may say about size not mattering, the fossa, a diminutive and distant cousin of the lion, clearly isn't listening. The creature, dubbed the Pink Panther of Madagascar, has the largest penis bone of all the cat-like species which, scientists believe, ensures that it is the real king of its island jungle. An adult fossa is about 3rft long and has a penis of about 7in, a sixth of its body length. If Man had the same ratio he would be 3ft tall and very smug. Scientists believe that the fossa is so well-endowed because of the demands of the female and the need to outdo male competitors. Lesley Dickie, presenting a study to the Zoological Society of London yesterday, said the large penis bone, the bacula, may be the secret to the fossa's ability to keep up an acceptable performance during mating sessions that last for up to eight hours. "It provides extra rigidity," she said. "It's nature's Viagra and in the case of the fossa size might be everything.""


Fatness is caused by a virus!: "As many as one in five Australians may have contracted a virus linked to obesity. Blood tests on 2000 Australians, carried out in the US, showed about 20 per cent of them had been exposed to a virus called Ad-36, which some researchers say can cause weight gain. The idea that fatness is catching is controversial. However, Richard Atkinson, Emeritus Professor of Medicine at the University of Wisconsin in Madison, who did the testing, said a fat virus could help explain the worldwide epidemic of obesity. "I believe obesity is a complex disease of many causes, one of which is viral infection," he said. How Ad-36 caused fatness was not known exactly, but it had been detected in fat cells in people and animals. In the laboratory it stimulates cells that are pre-fat cells to become fat cells."