Features

Consultant Urological Surgeon and Consultant in Sexual Medicine

Many women excuse their low libido (sex drive) as part of the ageing process or due to changes in their bodies. But when your low libido starts interfering with your quality of life and puts a strain on your relationship, then it is time to seek professional help.

Loss of sexual desire or low libido in women is known medically as hypoactive sexual desire disorder (HSDD). HSDD is not uncommon. In fact, it affects 10 per cent of women. Sexual desire in women is multifaceted and requires a balanced neurohormonal system (there are a number of neurohormones and neurotransmitters that play an important role in regulating female sex behaviour). Compared to men, the emotional and psychological factors for women are often of greater importance for a healthy libido than the physiological factors. 

Symptoms associated with HSDD

If you have any of the following symptoms, especially if associated with anxiety, then you may suffer from HSDD: 

• Little to no interest in sexual activity

• Few to no sexual thoughts or fantasies 

• Disinterest in initiating sex

• Difficulty getting pleasure from sex

• Lack of pleasurable sensations when the genitals are stimulated

Causes of low sexual desire in women

Lack of sleep

I put this first because it is the most ignored cause of low libido, especially for new mothers with a newborn baby or a busy working mother, juggling work, kids and home. For women, more sleep leads to higher levels of sexual desire and better arousal the next day, according to 2015 study published in the Journal of Sexual Medicine. In fact, just one more hour of sleep was linked to a 14 per cent increase in the odds a woman would engage in sexual activity with a partner.

Medications

Many medications can lead to low sexual desire — the most common are selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors (SSRIs), a widely used type of antidepressant medication, and some oral contraceptives. If you are on an SSRI antidepressant and you start suffering from low libido, speak to your psychiatrist to replace it with a non-SSRI antidepressant — my favourite is bupropion because it increases brain dopamine which is an important neurotransmitter for a healthy libido.

Medical diseases

Many health conditions are associated with loss of sexual desire, such as cancer, arthritis, diabetes, neurological disease and heart disease. All these can be associated with reduction in sex drive. HSDD affects 10 per cent of women.

Sexual problems

If you have pain during sex then this may lead to loss of interest in sex. Pain during sex has many causes (vaginal spasm, infection or vaginal dryness). Most of these issues can be treated easily so do not delay speaking to your doctor for advice.

Hormonal problems

Women are more sensitive to hormonal changes than men and hormonal imbalance can lead to loss of libido. The most common hormonal cause of loss of desire is menopause, when the level of testosterone drops. Because testosterone is the main hormone responsible for libido, interest in sex may drop. Plus, due to falling oestrogen levels, vaginal tissue becomes thinner and drier, resulting in painful sex. If a woman undergoes oophorectomy (ovary removal surgery), her levels of both oestrogen and progesterone plunge, resulting in early menopause and the same issues, mentioned above. Treatment in these cases involves testosterone replacement and local oestrogen therapy so you can still enjoy a healthy sex life with your partner. 

Relationship issues

For women especially, emotional closeness is essential for healthy sexual intimacy, so if you have relationship issues with your partner such as trust issues, lack of connection, frequent arguments or a history of infidelity, these will impact your sexual desire or lack of interest in engaging in sexual relations with your partner. Thus, communication is essential to mend the relationship. Do not hesitate to ask for advice from a relationship expert.

Psychological causes

Depression, poor body image, low self-esteem, history of sexual abuse and bad previous sexual experiences are all factors that can lead to loss of interest in intimate relations with your partner. As a sexual medicine expert, I find these causes very challenging to deal with, especially if the partners are not cooperating. I recommend a multidisciplinary team to deal with these cases, including psychologist, psychiatrist and a sexual health expert.

Treating HSDD

Science has failed in finding an effective pink Viagra but some progress has been made in recent years.

•Testosterone patches have been approved to treat low desire in women, especially during perimenopause 

• Addyi (filbnastrien) was approved two years ago in the United States as the first female libido enhancing pill but, unfortunately, the results in the clinical practice was not very impressive 

• Viagra, which is used for male erectile dysfunction, may help certain cases of HSDD as it enhances blood flow to the genital area and improves lubrication and genital engorgement

• Behavioural treatment includes sensate focus which is a series of intimate physical exercises we ask the couple to perform in stages that enhance connection and intimacy. Also, mindfulness is very helpful in treating low libido, especially if it is secondary to psychological factors

Low libido is a significant and common problem not to be ignored. The most important in dealing with this problem is open communication with your partner and seeking professional help when required.

Reprinted with permission from Family Flavours magazine

Potentially harmful pharmaceuticals not listed on product labels were found in more than 700 over-the-counter dietary supplements, researchers report. 

The pharmaceuticals, which were found in so-called natural products, were most likely to appear in supplements marketed as weight loss aids, muscle builders and male libido enhancers, according to the report published in JAMA Network Open. 

Data for the study came from the Food and Drug Administration’s (FDA) was not Tainted Products Marketed as Dietary Supplements, Centre for Drug Evaluation and Research database. The researchers, led by Madhur Kumar of the California Department of Public Health in Sacramento, identified 776 tainted supplements in the database, from 2007 to 2016. 

To put the problem in perspective, the authors point to a study published in 2015 in The New England Journal of Medicine. That study found dietary supplement use was associated with 23,000 emergency department visits and 2,000 hospitalisations each year. 

Of the tainted products in the current study, 45.5 per cent were marketed as aids for sexual enhancement, 40.9 per cent for weight loss, and 11.9 per cent for muscle building. They contained pharmaceuticals such as sildenafil, which is the active ingredient in Viagra; sibutramine, which is the active ingredient in Meridia, a weight loss drug removed from the market because of links to stroke and other cardiovascular events; and anabolic steroids or steroid-like substances. 

Dr Louis Aronne was not at all surprised by the study’s findings. “This is something we’ve seen again and again and again,” said Aronne, a professor of metabolic research and director of the Comprehensive Weight Control Centre at Weill Cornell Medicine in New York City. “There’s no evidence that over-the-counter products work for weight loss and the ones that do work seem to have a high risk of being what the FDA calls ‘adulterated,’” Aronne said. “They have prescription medications in them and that is why they work.” 

Another danger in these “adulterated” supplements is that “they can have a combination of many different agents that do similar things that add up to a pharmacologic effect”, Aronne said. Unfortunately, he added, “people want to believe these things work and have no side effects”. 

Tainted supplements are very hard to regulate, Aronne said, because they are often sold and marketed on the internet. 

What the California researchers reported “is just the tip of the iceberg”, Aronne said. A big part of the problem, he said, is that US laws allow a company “to say anything it wants and it’s up to the FDA and the Federal Trade Commission to stop it from saying it. In Canada the rules are different. Health Canada has to approve the claims that are on the label”. 

When it comes to supplements that promise to aid in weight loss, muscle gain or libido enhancement, “it’s the Wild West”, said Dr Lawrence Appel, director of the Welch Centre for Prevention, Epidemiology and Clinical Research at the Johns Hopkins Medical Institutions in Baltimore. “There’s a huge amount of really, almost unregulated supplements.” 

Daniel Fabricant, CEO/President of the Natural Products Association, argues that most supplements are at least as safe as medications approved by the FDA. The products reported in the new study “aren’t dietary supplements”, Fabricant said. “They are drugs masquerading as supplements. We support prosecution of criminal activity whether it’s illegal drugs coming into our country or illegal drugs in supplements.” 

Supplement safety is monitored by the same kind of adverse event reporting system that keeps track of medications after they are approved by the FDA, said Fabricant, who is a former director of the division of dietary supplement programmes at the FDA. 

Fabricant offered some advice on how to avoid tainted supplements. 

“There are some red flags,” he said. “If it sounds too good to be true, it is too good to be true. If it’s promising great weight loss gains, or great strength gains or it says it’s comparable to Viagra, that’s a red flag. And look out for products that have labels in dual languages.” 

The California Department of Public Health would not make the authors available for comment. 

Although nail polish manufacturers have begun removing some toxic ingredients, their labels are not always accurate and the reformulated products aren’t necessarily safer, suggests a new study. 

“We were trying to learn more about what ingredients were in nail polish, and the more we dug deep into the labels, the more confused I was about the health claims, which I knew would be confusing for consumers and nail salon workers, too,” said lead author Anna Young of the Harvard T. H. Chan School of Public Health in Boston. 

In the 2000s, nail polish manufacturers started phasing out three particularly toxic chemicals: Formaldehyde, toluene and dibutyl phthalate (DnBP). They would label these formulations as “3-free”. However, many of these products replaced those chemicals with another plasticiser, triphenyl phosphate (TPHP), which has since been shown to be potentially toxic as well. 

The European Union banned DnBP in cosmetics in 2004, Young’s team notes in Environmental Science and Technology. 

The US Food and Drug Administration requires ingredient labels on nail polishes but doesn’t require products to be tested for safety before entering the market, the researchers add. In addition, certain chemicals such as phthalates can be listed as “fragrance” due to trade secret concerns. 

“It’s a chemical Whack-a-Mole,” Young said in a phone interview. “That’s especially important for nail salon workers because some of these toxins are linked to complications with fertility, thyroid issues, obesity and cancer.” 

Young and colleagues measured the concentrations of 22 plasticisers in 40 nail polish samples to compare the label to actual ingredients. 

The samples included different colours, finishes and top coats, and the researchers analysed them for 12 phthalate and 10 organophosphate plasticisers. 

Among the samples were 11 different “n-free” labels, ranging from “3-free” to “13-free”. All of the samples included significant levels of at least one plasticiser, and most contained at least five of the 22 ingredients studied. The “5-free” to “13-free” samples had lower levels in general than unlabelled or “3-free” samples, the study team notes. 

TPHP, which is used as a plasticiser and flame retardant in a number of consumer products, was found in 40 per cent of the samples. It was detected in 12 of the 27 products that did not list it as an ingredient. 

The research team was pleased to find that DnBP wasn’t in any of the samples, and TPHP seemed to be in lower concentrations than reported in previous studies. 

At the same time, the products with lower TPHP levels tended to have higher levels of didiethylhexyl phthalate, a hormone-disrupting chemical and possible carcinogen that was banned from cosmetics in the EU at the same time as DnBP, the authors note. 

Overall, Young’s team concludes that label contents can be defined differently by different brands, the ingredient exclusions are usually not validated by a third party, and new label types are often not consistent with the preceding labels in terms of what ingredients are excluded. 

“It’s important for consumers to understand that ‘n-free’ can mean different things to different companies,” said Heather Stapleton of Duke University in Durham, North Carolina, who wasn’t involved in the study.

“More research is warranted to understand the exposure levels that consumers are receiving,” Stapleton said in an e-mail. “It’s important to know what these labels mean and how they relate to chemical exposure.”

SAN FRANCISCO — Google unveiled changes aimed at making the leading search engine more visual and intuitive to the point that it can answer questions before being asked.

Artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning are core drivers of how Google will pursue its mission to organise the world’s information and make it accessible to anyone, search Vice President Ben Gomes said at an event in San Francisco.

The search engine focused strongly on mobile use and appeared to be growing more like Facebook, encouraging users to linger and explore topics, interests or stories with growing emphasis on photos and videos. Results will be increasingly personalised.

“Search is not perfect, and we are under no illusions it is,” Gomes recently said.

“But, you have our commitment that we will make it better every day.”

He described the latest changes as shifting from answers to journeys, providing ways to target queries without knowing what words to use and enhancing image-based searches.

Searching with pictures

Google Images was redesigned to weave in “Lens” technology that enables queries based on what is pointed out in pictures.

The Images overhaul includes carousels of online video clip highlights displayed with mobile search query results.

New Activity Cards will let users pick up searches where they left off, eliminating the need to retrace online steps.

The search engine will also let users create Collections of online content, and suggest related material that might be of interest.

A Google feed used by more than 800 million people monthly is getting a new name, Discover, and increased ability to offer people relevant information they are likely to want but have not thought to ask for yet.

The feature was described as “Google search helping you discover new things without a query”.

Google said it is also testing out an improvement to its job-related search results that will figure out what skills are needed for such posts and information about how to acquire them.

“Information and language are core to what we are as human beings,” Gomes said.

“Our work here is never done.”

Privacy and politics

Since being launched 20 years ago, Google has grown from simply a better way to explore the Internet to an online tool so woven into daily life that its name has become a verb.

Early days of search were about software matching keywords or precise phrases to content on web pages, with typos or imprecise queries destined to fail.

Google has consistently refined its search algorithm, which it keeps secret, and uses AI to understand what people are looking for online and to tailor results based on what it knows about users individually and collectively.

Google’s rise put it in the crosshairs of regulators, especially in Europe, due to concerns it may be abusing its domination of online search and advertising as well as Android smartphone operating software.

There have been concerns that parent company Alphabet is more interested in making money from people’s data than in safeguarding their privacy.

Google was under fire anew from privacy advocates for a change that automatically signs users into Chrome browsers on desktop computers when they sign into any of the company’s other services such as Gmail or search.

Chrome search data is not in sync with Google servers unless that function is enabled, the company said in an update to its policies.

Google is among the tech companies being called upon to better guard against the spread of misinformation — and has also been a target of US President Donald Trump, who added his voice to a chorus of Republicans who contend conservative viewpoints are downplayed in search results.

Google’s anniversary also comes with the rising trend of people engaging with the Internet through voice-commanded digital assistants, including one backed by the Silicon Valley giant.

Seattle-based Amazon last week sought to make its Alexa digital assistant and online services a bigger part of people’s lives with an array of new products and partnerships.

PARIS — From family and friends to strangers on the subway and public figures on 24-hour news cycles, humans recognise an astonishing 5,000 faces, scientists said on Wednesday in the first study of its kind.

Through most of history humans lived in small groups of a hundred or so individuals, a pattern that has changed drastically in recent centuries.

A study by scientists at Britain’s University of York found that our facial recognition abilities allow us to process the thousands of faces we encounter in busy social environments, on our smartphones and our television screens every day. 

“In everyday life, we are used to identifying friends, colleagues and celebrities, and many other people by their faces,” Rob Jenkins, from York’s Department of Psychology, told AFP.

“But no one has established how many faces people actually know.”

For the study, published in the journal Proceedings of the Royal Society B, Jenkins and his team asked participants to write down as many faces they could remember from their personal lives. 

The volunteers were then asked to do the same with people they recognised but did not know personally.

They were also shown thousands of images of famous people — two photos of each to ensure consistency — and asked which ones they recognised. 

The team found an enormous range of the number of faces each participant could recall, from roughly 1,000-10,000.

“We found that people know around 5,000 faces on average,” Jenkins said.

“It seems that whatever mental apparatus allows us to differentiate dozens of people also allows us to differentiate thousands of people.”

Never forget face

The team said it believes this figure — the first ever baseline of human “facial vocabulary”, could aid the development of facial recognition software increasingly used at airports and criminal investigations. 

It may also help scientists better understand cases of mistaken identity.

“Psychological research in humans has revealed important differences between unfamiliar and familiar face recognition,” said Jenkins. 

“Unfamiliar faces are often misidentified. Familiar faces are identified very reliably, but we don’t know exactly how.”

While the team said it was focused on how many faces humans actually know, they said it might be possible for some people to continue learning to recognise an unlimited number of faces, given enough practice. 

They pointed out that the brain has an almost limitless capacity to memorise words and languages — the limits on these instead come from study time and motivation.

The range of faces recognised by participants went far beyond what may have been evolutionarily useful: for thousands of years humans would likely only have met a few dozen people throughout their lives. 

Jenkins said it was not clear why we developed the ability to distinguish between thousands of faces in the crowd.

“This could be another case of ‘overkill’ that is sometimes seen in nature,” he said.

“The venom of some spiders can kill a horse, even though the spider has no need to eat a horse.”

SAN FRANCISCO — Alphabet Inc.’s Google on Tuesday unveiled the third edition of its Pixel smartphone, a Google Home smart speaker with a display and its first tablet computer as it makes a come-from-behind push into hardware. 

The company’s Android software has gone from being an also-ran to the brains of most of the world’s smartphones and Google topped Amazon.com Inc. in smart speaker sales in recent quarters. 

Pixel phones, though, have been a tougher sell, launching with glitches and garnering less than 1 per cent of the global market by shipments in Google’s first two years of trying, according to research firm Strategy Analytics. 

The Pixel 3, priced at $799, and a larger Pixel 3 XL, priced at $899, mark Google’s latest entries for a phone line-up it hopes will someday be as popular as Apple Inc.’s iPhone. 

The Pixel Slate tablet runs Google’s beefier Chrome OS laptop operating system rather than Android. It is priced at $599, aimed at competing with Apple’s iPad Pro. 

Shares of Alphabet barely moved on the announcements. Financial analysts said it is difficult to evaluate Google’s hardware business as it is overshadowed by profits from search ads. 

Google branched into hardware three years ago so that, like Apple, it could have full control of the performance of its applications and the revenue they generate. Other phone makers sometimes crowd out Google’s apps with their own or take a share of ad revenue, hurting Alphabet’s profits. 

Expanding geographic distribution should provide a small boost to the Pixel line-up. The Pixel 3 will launch in 10 countries, up from six for the Pixel 2 a year ago. New additions include France, Ireland, Japan and Taiwan. 

The Slate is available in the United States, the UK and Canada. 

A new artificial intelligence tool sure to generate buzz among consumers also could be helpful. The software, launching on US Pixels only, answers calls, requests information about the nature of the calls and shares it as text with the recipient. 

“We’ve built the first phone that can answer the phone,” Rick Osterloh, Google’s senior vice president for hardware, told media on Tuesday. 

Ryan Reith, who leads device research at tech consulting firm IDC, said Google did not change enough in the Pixel 3 for it to stand apart from more well-known competitors. 

“Some of the stuff they are doing with software and artificial intelligence is certainly leading edge,” he said. “But as a lot of the technology advancements become more naked to the eye, it becomes that much tougher to sell.” 

Google shipped 2.53 million Pixel 2 and 2 XL devices through the nine months ended June 30, Strategy Analytics said. The first Pixel devices hit 2.4 million shipments in the nine months ended on June 30, 2017, the firm said. 

Limited adoption has reflected Google’s hesitancy to go as wide and big in distributing and marketing the Pixel as Apple, which launched its last two iPhone line-ups in about 50 countries. 

Going from a small experiment to a polished product that works in various languages and is backed by large sales, support and technical teams has been part of Google’s challenge. 

Last year’s Pixel 2 arrived with bugs that prompted user complaints about unwanted noises during calls, a crashing camera app and an unexpected screen tint. In response, Google doubled warranties to two years. 

The Pixel 3 faces continued limited sales in the United States since Google again signed an exclusive distribution deal with wireless carrier Verizon Communications Inc. that means the device will get little marketing from other carriers. 

Google said it would augment distribution by opening two temporary stores in popular neighbourhoods of Chicago and New York on October 18, and putting up displays at US tech retailer B8ta and Goop. 

Google’s new smart speaker, which has a display to show visual responses to voice commands, mostly matches offerings from Amazon.com Inc. and Facebook Inc. 

Unlike its competitors, Google said its Home Hub, priced at $149, does not have a video conferencing camera. Home Hub is launching in the United States, the UK and Australia. 

The nod to privacy concerns comes as Google and other big US tech companies try to bounce back from recent data breach scandals. 

Amazon shipped 21.5 million smart speakers, including those with displays, in the year ended June 30, compared with 18.3 million for Google, according to research firm Canalys. 

Google said in a blog post on Tuesday that it recently delivered some Google Home speakers within 10 minutes of ordering using drones from Alphabet’s Wing. 

Shares of speaker maker Sonos Inc. were down 5.6 per cent on Tuesday.

Google faced a fresh privacy backlash Tuesday over a glitch that may have exposed data from half a million users, overshadowing the Silicon Valley’s launch of a new smartphone and other devices.

The Silicon Valley giant said Monday it shut down its Google+ social network for consumers after it found and fixed a bug exposing private data in as many as 500,000 accounts, but drew fire for initially failing to disclose the incident.

The revelation heightened concerns in Washington over privacy practices by Silicon Valley giants after a series of missteps by Facebook that may have leaked data on millions.

“In the last year, we’ve seen Google try to evade scrutiny — both for its business practices and its treatment of user data,” Senator Mark Warner said in a statement.

Warner said that despite “consent” agreements with the US Federal Trade Commission (FTC) with Google and Facebook, “neither company appears to have been particularly chastened in their privacy practices”. 

“It’s clear that Congress needs to step in” for privacy protections, he added.

Marc Rotenberg, president of the Electronic Privacy Information Centre, said the latest breach suggests the FTC has failed to do its job in protecting user data.

“The Congress needs to establish a data protection agency in the United States,” Rotenberg said. “Data breaches are increasing but the FTC lacks the political will to enforce its own legal judgements.”

Senator Richard Blumenthal said the news shows that “to truly end this cycle of broken promises, we need a national privacy framework that protects consumers”.

Security researcher Graham Cluley said in a blog that “the big story is that Google knew months ago that user data had been exposed and chose to keep the fact quiet”.

“Did no one tell them that cover-ups are always worse than coming clean?” he added.

Princeton University researcher Arvind Narayanan noted in a Tweet that Google revealed a “vulnerability” rather than a data breach but he noted that “Google has no way to know if the vulnerability was exploited in the past — precisely because of [its] privacy by design.”

Drivers who hit the road on less than four hours of sleep are at least as likely to be involved in a crash as drivers who had too much to drink, a US study suggests. 

Brian Tefft, senior researcher at the AAA Foundation for Traffic Safety in Washington, DC, reviewed data on more than 6,800 road accidents between 2005 and 2007 to study the effects of sleep deprivation on driving. 

“We really wanted to quantify” the relationship between how sleep-deprived a driver is, and “how much it affects their crash risk”, Tefft told Reuters Health by phone. 

As part of an earlier study, the drivers in these accidents had all been interviewed in depth by investigators from the US Department of Transportation. Tefft classified the drivers into those who were “culpable” for a crash and those who were not. 

Drivers whose errors, actions, or lack of actions, led to a crash were deemed culpable, whereas those involved in crashes caused by external factors, such as brake failure or poor infrastructure, were not. 

His findings showed that people who drove after getting less than seven hours of sleep were at higher risk for being culpable for the crash. That risk was greatest for drivers who slept less than four hours. 

 “The sharp increase in risk below four hours stands out,” the University of Pittsburgh’s Dr Sanjay Patel, who was not involved in the study, told Reuters Health in an email. 

“The odds of being responsible for a crash go up from 2.9-fold to 15.1-fold as sleep drops from four to five hours to less than four hours. But that... is not surprising given what we know about how decreasing sleep affects other aspects of brain function,” Patel said. 

Drivers who reported having slept for less than four hours had “crash risks” similar to what is been documented in drivers with blood alcohol concentrations (BAC) of 0.12 g/dL, Tefft notes in his report. In the US, driving with a BAC of 0.08 g/dL or higher is illegal, with lower limits for commercial drivers. Most of Western Europe and Japan have stricter limits. 

One weakness of the study is that it relied on drivers themselves to report how much they had slept. Another potential weakness is that other factors, like the presence of a sleep disorder, could contribute to crash risk. 

Also, Patel pointed out, “Drivers deemed non-culpable may still have been partially responsible for the crash — they [may have been] slow in veering out of the way of the culpable driver, for example.” 

Overall, 78 per cent of non-culpable drivers and 70 per cent of culpable drivers reported having slept for seven to nine hours in the 24 hours before crashing, Tefft reported in the journal Sleep. 

The study also found that drivers who had recently changed their sleep or work schedule had about a 30 per cent increase in their risk of causing a crash. 

“[This shows that] independently of the effect of sleep deprivation, disruption in the body’s internal clock can also increase one’s risk of causing a crash,” Tefft said. 

Drivers who spent less than four hours asleep in a 24-hour period are also at a significantly greater risk of being culpable in a single-vehicle crash than in one that involves another vehicle, the study showed. 

Single-vehicle crashes are more than three times as likely as multiple-vehicle crashes to result in fatalities, Tefft said. 

Data from the National Sleep Foundation show 60 per cent of US adults have driven while feeling drowsy and around 33 per cent have actually fallen asleep at the wheel. 

Benjamin McManus, a researcher in the Translational Research and Injury Prevention Laboratory at The University of Alabama at Birmingham, says Tefft’s study indicates sleep-deprived crashes are not all cases of “nodding off” or being “asleep-at-the-wheel”. 

“Judgement and decision making are highly impacted by poor sleep quantity and quality,” McManus said in an email. 

“With changes in the work economy and growth of ridesharing, we’re seeing a growth of a ‘gig’ economy where many work from home, work irregular hours, or work multiple jobs. [Data like this] may make the difference between recommendations of ‘you need a cup of coffee’ versus ‘you need a nap.’” 

First launched in2015, the Jaguar XE was intended to be the premium British automaker’s more accessible entry-level model that should also be more popular and attainable for drivers in highly taxed developing automotive markets.

Successor to the Ford Mondeo-based X-Type, the XE is an altogether different car rooted in Jaguar’s sporting heritage and designed with a modern flavour. An authentic rear-drive challenger to the German compact executive car troika of the Audi A4, Mercedes-Benz C-Class and BMW 3-Series, the talented XE also faces competition from cars like the Infiniti Q50 and Alfa Romeo Giulia.

Sporty yet supple

Contrary to any lingering stuffy misconceptions about Jaguar, the XE is a thoroughly modern and distinctly sporty saloon car priced to compete directly with rivals. Of the sportiest in its class, it is characterised by a combination of eager and adjustable handling and a supple and forgiving ride associated with Jaguar by those more familiar with the brand.

An ideal car for a thirty-something trading-up from a hot hatch or small sports car like a Mazda MX-5 or Subaru BRZ to something more grown-up, practical and premium for a young family, the XE delivers a similarly visceral drive and doesn’t skimp on the smiles.

The smallest of Jaguar’s saloons, the XE bears clear resemblance to the XF executive and XJ luxury model, and features similar lightweight aluminium-intensive construction and a swept back and seemingly ready to pounce sense of tension.

With slim, squinting deep-set headlights, broad and snouty wire-mesh grille, the XE has a dramatic demeanour, while its short front overhang, long bonnet and rakish roofline are distinctly sporting. At the rear, its high-set and short boot looks best with a colour contrasting to its lower black fascia insert. In black body colour, and with no contrast, the rear looks slightly compressed.

Eager performer

Powered by a Jaguar-modified version of Ford’s tried, tested and effective turbocharged 2-litre direct injection 4-cylinder Ecoboost engine, the XE, however, will soon feature the petrol version of Jaguar’s own new Ingenium engine line. Offered in different states of tune, the entry-level XE 20t 2-litre model develops 197BHP at 5,500rpm and 236lb/ft throughout a wide 1,750-4,000rpm sweet spot. 

Quick scrolling, responsive and with near imperceptible low-end turbo lag, the XE 20t is quick on its feet. Launching from standstill to 100km/h in 7.7-seconds, the 20t is capable of a 238km/h top speed, and can return restrained 7.5l/100km fuel efficiency.

Eager from low-end, muscularly versatile in mid-range and willing to top-end, the XE 20t is quick on level ground and remains confident on steep inclines. Its throttle control is uncharacteristically precise, delicate and responsive for a turbocharged car, and allows easy power modulation to accurately and intuitively balance the XE through cornering drifts.

However, there is slight overrun boost when at throttle lift-off from high revs and heavy load. Smooth, slick and responsive, the XE’s 8-speed automatic gearbox is happy to take multiple shift inputs in manual paddle shift mode, while shifts become more succinctly aggressive and gears can be held at redline in Sport driving mode.

Balanced and adjustable

Riding on sophisticated and sporty double wishbone front and integral-link rear suspension with fixed rate dampers, the XE achieves a commendable combination of ride comfort and lateral body lean control. With a slightly firm primary response over jagged road surfaces, the XE’s secondary responses are otherwise comfortable, smooth and absorbent. 

As speed picks up, the XE better still processes imperfections with a supple, fluent and textured manner. A lovely drive through sprawling, winding country lanes, the XE’s side-to-side motion is well controlled. And while there is slight vertical pitch on crests, rebound control and dips are processed with taut and settled control. 

Flowing and fluid through switchbacks, the XE’s suspension and steering work in brilliant harmony, with the latter being light, quick and precise. More so, its steering offers excellent feel and nuanced, textured fingertip feel for its segment, and is a joy. Balanced, eager, tidy and accurate into corners, with good front grip, the XE rear is meanwhile set-up for effortlessly easy and predictable drifts and slides. Best left on in normal driving or when storming through empty switchbacks, the XE’s drifts are reined in by stability controls, but are near telepathically intuitive with stability controls off through low speed snaking hill climbs.

Charisma and class

Great fun to balance with on-throttle control, the XE would further benefit were it to have a limited-slip rear differential. However, with stability control on low setting, it gives a taste of the beginning of a drift before brakes and power cuts manage a tidy cornering line.

Through hard driven, slickly paved switchbacks, its rear was a little fidgety and had an instinct to initiate unwanted drifts, unless one is late back on the throttle. That said, winter driving mode dulled throttle response for a smoother and more sure-footed drive, and newly paved roads provided more traction and more tenacious rear grip. 

Charismatic, classy and entertaining, the XE’s cabin has a sporty twin pod like design with a jutting high waistline. Design, ergonomics and seating position are attentively good, but firmer lumbar support on longer drives would be appreciated.

Materials include a mix of soft textures, good quality and hard-wearing leather, mixed with some hard plastics in the centre console. Front space was good, but the XE’s rear headroom and legroom isn’t really intended for tall and large passengers, who would be better served with an XF or XJ. Not the roomiest in its class, the XE does however have a generous boot.

Equipment levels are good, but the model driven notably didn’t have remote sensing door locks, and no blind spot warning, which would have been useful, if not necessary given the rakish roofline and Amman driver’s penchant for overtaking suddenly at either side. 

The tested car had over 15,000km and is presumably an often hard-driven customer demonstrator, the XE Prestige trim XE driven felt at its prime mechanically, and still fresh inside, but one row of console buttons felt a bit too firm to the touch.

TECHNICAL SPECIFICATIONS

• Engine: 2-litre, turbocharged, in-line 4-cylinders
• Bore x stroke: 87.5 x 83.1mm
• Compression ratio: 10:1
• Valve-train: 16-valve, DOHC, variable timing, direct injection
• Gearbox: 8-speed automatic, rear-wheel-drive
• Ratios: 1st 4.71; 2nd 3.14; 3rd 2.11; 4th 1.67; 5th 1.29; 6th 1.0; 7th 0.84; 8th 0.67
• Reverse/final drive ratios: 3.3/3.42
• Power, BHP (PS) [kW]: 197 (200) [147] @5,500rpm
• Specific power: 98.6BHP/litre
• Power-to-weight: 128.8BHP/tonne
• Torque, lb/ft (Nm): 236 (320) @1,750-4,000rpm
• Specific torque: 160Nm/litre
• Torque-to-weight: 209Nm/tonne
• 0-100km/h: 7.7-seconds
• Top speed: 238km/h
• Fuel economy, combined: 7.5-litres/100km
• CO2 emissions, combined: 179g/km
• Fuel capacity: 63-litres
• Length: 4672mm
• Width: 1850mm
• Height: 1416mm
• Wheelbase: 2835mm
• Track, F/R: 1602/1603mm
• Boot volume: 450-litres
• Unladen weight: 1530kg
• Suspension, F/R: Double wishbones, integral-link
• Steering: Electric-assisted rack & pinion
• Turning circle: 11.22-metres
• Brakes, F/R: Ventilated discs/discs
• Tyres: 225/50R17
• Price, as tested (starting from): JD45,000 (JD38,000)