The pill for the man was successfully used in initial tests on humans. However, according to experts, another decade could pass before it goes on the market. Why is that?
Often, contraception is still considered a woman’s thing – but the pill for men has been in development for years. A first study in March 2018 showed that the hormone level, which is responsible for the continuous production of sperm, can be reduced by the pill’s prototype for men. But there was no evidence of how the pill affects libido.
A pill named 11-beta-MNTDC
This prototype has been continuously evolving since then and has now passed further tests, according to researchers from the University of Washington and LA BioMed at the Endocrine 2019 Meeting in New Orleans. For the 28-day trial, 30 men from Group One took the pill with the current name 11-beta-MNTDC, and ten more men from a control group took a placebo.
During the test period, according to the scientists, the sperm production of the participants from the first group fell sharply – side effects hardly occurred. Five affected men had less desire for sex, two described mild erectile dysfunction. The general sexual activity remained the same for all subjects and no one broke off the test prematurely. The researchers cautiously agrees with the result – however, long-term studies with more participants still have to confirm the conclusion.
Ten years waiting time
Nevertheless, experts at the conference estimated that it could take another ten years for the man to actually get the pill on the market. And that’s not just because there are only a few small studies on the subject. It is thought that the interest in the pill for the man is neither socially nor commercially particularly large – thereby show initial surveys among men that they would consider the use.
How do women actually look like that?
The women’s point of view in the debate is interesting: in a survey of Anglia Ruskin University , for example, 70 out of 134 women believed that their partner would simply forget the pill. As long as the reservations do not change, the development of the pill for the man presumably will continue to be halting.