GPs and pharmacists will be able to supply poppers as a sex aid under a major TGA revamp designed to reduce harms of substances being sold in adult shops as leather cleaners and room odourisers.

Last year, the medicines watchdog triggered a backlash from the LGBTQ community after it suggested banning all alkyl nitrites by making them schedule 9 drugs, putting them in the same class as heroin and cocaine.

It claimed there was evidence that their use was linked with numerous adverse events, including maculopathies.

But with poppers being used in the LGBTQ community since the 1970s, the TGA was accused of attempting to criminalise the sex lives of gay men and queer Australians.