Male birth control on the way
NSU scientist working on male contraceptive
Jaedda Armstrong
Section: News
Today the only birth control choices for men are condoms, vasectomies, or keep your zipper closed. But in the near future, men may get an alternative that many women have already been sticking to.
After having six children with his wife who couldn't take birth control for health reasons, biochemist Joseph C. Hall, wants to provide men with something more, well, let's say, convenient.
No not the pill, at least not yet. Hall, director for Biotechnology and Biomedical Sciences at Norfolk State University, has spent nearly 20 years attempting to develop a male patch.
The National Institutes of Health program renewed NSU's annual grant for $756,000 this year to help Hall and his faculty associates further their research.
Hall's goal is to develop a safe and reliable birth control to prevent male sperm from recognizing and binding to an egg inside a woman's ovaries. His approach is to identify enzymes, proteins produced by living cells, which are required to bind and penetrate the sugar coating surrounding an egg and block their interaction. Hall and his team have successfully neutralized the sperm-egg interactions using rats, but they are using a computer-assisted drug design system to produce compounds that will neutralize the interaction in humans. In other words, make the sperm dumb without making the man impotent.
The male contraceptive could be on the market in five to seven years in patch form, Hall said, but it's still in the early stages of development.
Hall said the patch would be a benefit for third world and Newly Industrialized Countries where populations are rapidly increasing.
"In China, they still have the one baby policy where the state will only pay for one child per couple," he said. "The female genocide rate is exploding, because some men in other countries don't want daughters, so they terminate them."
Meanwhile, purchasing condoms can get pricey for a low income couple if the man has frequent protected sex, Hall added.
"Condoms are not cheap," Hall said. "A man can make love to his wife twice and have to get a sex bill."
Deanna Smith, an NSU science major who is part of the research team, said she's excited (from a scientific standpoint, of course) about the new birth control option.
"It's another alternative that doesn't have to be placed on the female," she said. "Sometimes birth control may not be healthy for a certain woman to take, so this is a great idea."
This article appeared in the September edition of Mix Magazine.
After having six children with his wife who couldn't take birth control for health reasons, biochemist Joseph C. Hall, wants to provide men with something more, well, let's say, convenient.
No not the pill, at least not yet. Hall, director for Biotechnology and Biomedical Sciences at Norfolk State University, has spent nearly 20 years attempting to develop a male patch.
The National Institutes of Health program renewed NSU's annual grant for $756,000 this year to help Hall and his faculty associates further their research.
Hall's goal is to develop a safe and reliable birth control to prevent male sperm from recognizing and binding to an egg inside a woman's ovaries. His approach is to identify enzymes, proteins produced by living cells, which are required to bind and penetrate the sugar coating surrounding an egg and block their interaction. Hall and his team have successfully neutralized the sperm-egg interactions using rats, but they are using a computer-assisted drug design system to produce compounds that will neutralize the interaction in humans. In other words, make the sperm dumb without making the man impotent.
The male contraceptive could be on the market in five to seven years in patch form, Hall said, but it's still in the early stages of development.
Hall said the patch would be a benefit for third world and Newly Industrialized Countries where populations are rapidly increasing.
"In China, they still have the one baby policy where the state will only pay for one child per couple," he said. "The female genocide rate is exploding, because some men in other countries don't want daughters, so they terminate them."
Meanwhile, purchasing condoms can get pricey for a low income couple if the man has frequent protected sex, Hall added.
"Condoms are not cheap," Hall said. "A man can make love to his wife twice and have to get a sex bill."
Deanna Smith, an NSU science major who is part of the research team, said she's excited (from a scientific standpoint, of course) about the new birth control option.
"It's another alternative that doesn't have to be placed on the female," she said. "Sometimes birth control may not be healthy for a certain woman to take, so this is a great idea."
This article appeared in the September edition of Mix Magazine.
August 30th
Spartan Echo TV
RSS/Java/Mobile
Viewing Comments 1 - 2 of 2
Jennifer
posted 10/19/07 @ 12:37 PM EST
Interesting article
Steve Johnson
posted 10/28/07 @ 2:18 AM EST
Fantastic!! This is amazing research! I'm surprised I haven't heard about this before. You guys need to get the word out. This is cool stuff. Really. (Continued…)
Post a Comment