Posted on 12/21/2017 1:11:03 PM PST by Red Badger
It's a gel, but it doesn't go where you'd think.
If you're a sperm-producer who doesn't want kids, your personal contribution to contraception is currently limited to condoms or the snip.
Needless to say, not everybody likes those choices. But now a topical treatment could add another simple, non-invasive option to the mix - it's a hormonal gel that reduces sperm count when applied to the skin.
Next April, researchers at the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development are expecting to begin clinical trials on this gel, which has been in development for several years.
In 2012 the team conducted a trial on a combination of two gels that successfully saw the number of sperm in their semen drop to less than 1 million per millilitre – a concentration that's far enough below the normal 15 to 200 million sperm per millilitre to actually hamper fertility.
Applying two gels (it had to be done on two different body parts, too) would be quite a hassle though, so now researchers have finally combined the treatment into one easy-to-use application.
The gel is a combination of synthetic versions of the hormones progesterone and testosterone.
The progesterone analogue, called nestorone, competes with the body's testosterone levels, reducing them in the testes just enough to prevent mature sperm from being made. The added boost of testosterone helps keep hormones balanced throughout the rest of the body.
By rubbing half a teaspoon of the quick-drying liquid each day onto a body part, such as the upper arms or shoulders (away from the family jewels is probably best), sperm levels will be kept down for the next couple of days.
The study will take in a few hundred partnered test subjects scattered over the US, Chile, Europe, and Kenya, who are expected to use the treatment over four months while their sperm levels are monitored.
Once they get the thumbs up, the couples are invited to go off all other forms of birth control, meaning for the next year the only thing between the test subjects and parenthood is the gel.
"I am very confident that if men put the gel on every day and apply it correctly, it will be effective," Stephanie Page, principle investigator and a professor of medicine at the University of Washington told Emily Mullin at MIT Technology Review.
Another trial is currently underway to ensure any stray gel rubbing onto a partner isn't cause for alarm.
Male contraceptives have been on the horizon for a while now. But while a number of progressive men are keen to carry their share of responsibility, fanfare isn't as loud as we might expect and not all pharmaceutical companies are clamouring for a piece of the pie.
For one thing, a number of the treatments currently in the pipeline include injections of one sort or another. On paper, that shouldn't scare your average fully grown male, but in reality it may not have everybody rushing out for a shot.
Another hurdle could simply be that a number of men just don't care when it comes to birth control. Or don't make the connection between female contraception and not having a baby.
With potential roadblocks like these in the way, anything that makes the process of male contraception as simple and foolproof as possible is a worthy goal.
Given the nature of clinical trials, even with a best case scenario we shouldn't expect this gel to be available on the market just yet.
But if this treatment passes with flying colours and makes it through red tape and regulations, it would be a great addition to our currently limited contraception choices.
It works real well on transgenders.
As a woman, are you going to trust men to apply it, apply it correctly and to be honest about applying it? Just remember...they’re not the ones who have to worry about getting pregnant.
Pepper peepee
I’ll bet it will turn you into a squeaky, transgendered libtard.
Honey, you’ve rubbed it in long enough. If you don’t stop now you’re going to...never mind, too late. Let me get you a wash cloth.
It’s NOT that hard (no pun intended) to have unprotected sex with one’s Mrs. and not have her get pregnant.
There’s not a tremendous number of days in the month when a woman has a really good chance of getting pregnant.
Unfortunately, I know too many married couples that tried hard for YEARS to have a baby, even after seeing doctors and getting help, and still not succeeding.
If you use it, you’re already a squeaky, transgendered libtard...............
“Is that hair gel?”
I can see it now.
Rising rates of male breast cancer or testicular cancer.
Wait till the stuff gets in the water supply bye bye human race
It’s a really sick mentality
A woman’s fertility is not a disease. A man’s potency is not a disease or a poison.
jus' sayin'
We are obliged once more to declare that the direct interruption of the generative process already begun and, above all, all direct abortion, even for therapeutic reasons, are to be absolutely excluded as lawful means of regulating the number of children. Equally to be condemned...is direct sterilization, whether of the man or of the woman, whether permanent or temporary.
Similarly excluded is any action which either before, at the moment of, or after sexual intercourse, is specifically intended to prevent procreation—whether as an end or as a means.
Neither is it valid to argue, as a justification for sexual intercourse which is deliberately contraceptive, that a lesser evil is to be preferred to a greater one, or that such intercourse would merge with procreative acts of past and future to form a single entity, and so be qualified by exactly the same moral goodness as these. Though it is true that sometimes it is lawful to tolerate a lesser moral evil in order to avoid a greater evil or in order to promote a greater good," it is never lawful, even for the gravest reasons, to do evil that good may come of it —in other words, to intend directly something which of its very nature contradicts the moral order, and which must therefore be judged unworthy of man, even though the intention is to protect or promote the welfare of an individual, of a family or of society in general. Consequently, it is a serious error to think that a whole married life of otherwise normal relations can justify sexual intercourse which is deliberately contraceptive and so intrinsically wrong.
-- Pope Paul VI, "Humanae Vitae", 1968
The scientists tell us that SPF from suntan lotions all over the world’s beaches, bith fresh and salt, is getting into the water and killing plankton and coral reefs.
Just wait till this stuff mingles into the waters..................
No, this only applies to straight men. We’re too low on the intersectionality totem pole to get fee stuff.
Won’t a picture of Rosie O’Donnell do the same thing?
That would cause permanent damage.
So, is there a topical gel that will stop “the nagging”?
“By the time I get it rubbed on, I won’t need to have sex”
==
Low hanging joke fruit there, but funny.
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