Trial For The Male Pill Shows No Side-effects
Blahbooboo3 writes "Men concerned about contraception may soon be able to use the male equivalent of the Pill, without the potential side-effects of a drug based on altering the balance of sex hormones. The drug, called Adjudin, works by disrupting the interaction that takes place in the testicles between immature sperm cells and the nurse cells responsible for nurturing sperm to maturity. The germ cells need to adhere to the nurse cells for sperm to properly develop, and the drug prevents this bond from forming. It looks like it will be a gel patch type of applicator."
This may well be the most irrelevant Slashdot story ever. No one who reads this site is in any position to use this pill. You can't get your hand pregnant.
...one time, and it's permanent! YAY!
unless some of these men would want to make kids someday... i have no clue why anyone would want to do that... *shrugs*
So far, this study has been done on mice only and the dosage was applied only once. The BBC has a decent write-up about it. Hopefully this will be applicable to humans, but many believe the exact drug will not work on human males.
I came, I saw, She conquered.
Hair loss and erectile dysfunction.
He told her he was on the male pill. She slapped him... That was the end of that.
Didn't they say that when they did the first trials for the female contraceptive pill?
Totally safe! No apparent bad things can happen!
Except blood clots and cancer, 20 years later..
Just get castrated like me. Try that for birth control! I have as much chance of having kids as Bush does of thinking logically.
...there is no chance of me (as a man) ever using this!
They say no side effects, but look at "safe" female contraception which may lead to increased chance of certain cancers (although decreased chance of others).
Not that I'm going to stop my gf taking the pill though...
SURELY NOT!!!!!
A vascetomy is reversable afaik.
XML is like violence. If it doesn't solve the problem, use more.
Great, we have a pill for men. The only problem is it's on a voluntary basis. Prescriptions based on intelligence and ability to support a child should determine candidacy for this pill.
Male pill...the man puts it in his shoe and it makes him limp.
You're using her as bait, Master!
I always wonder about the long-term effects of these pills. How do they know that, in 10-15 years, the pills won't cause permanent infertility in a certain percentage of males? How about in 20-50 years, that they won't have long-term defects in offspring. It's not that the research isn't a useful thing, but I think I'll let a generation or two act as the guinea pigs for this before me.
...it kept falling out. I really hope she figured it out and stayed out of the gene pool.
Its the price of being an early adopter, just like purchasing a 1st gen Nintendo DS or a 1st gen MacBook... except with your body.
The article doesn't explain exactly where you have to stick the gel patch ;).
- Blue if you are single.
- Green if you are in a relationship.
- Neon green if you are in a relationship with a lusty nerdess.
- Rainbow if you are gay.
- Yellow if you are a swinger.
On a more serious note, This development should seriously empower women. I know too many girls that have got pregnant during college and had to drop out. A friend of mine from highschool has three kids with three different guys. Perhaps some women will prefer to date guys that wear the patch regularly. Of course, then fake patches will show up.What about infertility?
groupthink: It's good for self-esteem.
Don't let my pasty white skin and ebbing physic fool you. Chicks dig scrawny pale guys, if you know where to look.
-Rick
"Most people in the U.S. wouldn't know they live in a tyrannical state if it walked up and grabbed their junk." - MyFirs
does a vasectomy ... eh ... unload the gun, or do you just start shooting blanks.
i.e., does the trouser snake still throw up, or does it turn into dry heaves
(serious question)
Jay | http://oldos.org
Gay or straight is not a binary thing. Gay men have been known to get women pregnant.
All it takes is a good pinhole stretched in it- which can happen if you use the wrong stuff for lubricant, etc...
I am not merely a "consumer" or a "taxpayer". I am a Citizen of the State of Texas
Think of taking this pill as Paternity Insurance. When some random girl you hooked up with one night (who swore she was on the pill) shows up 9 months later with a baby, a DNA test and a lawyer who will nail you for 18 years worth of child support you might be wishing you did.
And enough with the whining about side effects. Anabolic steroids can make your hair fall out, your epiphysia (growth plates) fuse prematurely, cover you in zits and make your nads shrivel to the size of raisins.....but some of you will take em anyway.
None of them can see the clouds; The polished wings don't care.
OK, the article was just fine, but I think that the story suggestions off to the side need reconsideration. "The Humble Banger: the secret life of the British sausage" just seems like it's pushing it on this particular story, doesn't it?
Can't get pregnant if you can't get laid...
Caveat Emptor is not a business model.
Yeah, but then you'll just buy a lawnba mower robot and it'll be all good. With the new super-realistic love dolls and high-wattage white-noise machines, women are practically irrelevant; now that robots can do chores and computers can waste time and fail consistently, we can dispense with children! All we need now are some quality bots for our multiplayer games that are capable of drinking our beer and spilling chips on our floors, and we'll never need to interact socially ever again!
Because if the girl you are with feels safe enough letting you say you are on pill so everything will be fine, probably isnt the type of girl you want to have sex with, without a condom on too.
The phrase "more better" is acceptable English. suck it grammar Nazis
to trust a guy who says, "Trust me baby, I'm on the pill." Seems like this is a pointless development, because smart women won't trust the guys they hook up with the be telling the truth.
"Politicians always tell the truth, when they're calling each other liars."
Thank you, but i prefer to plan my (sexual) life according to _my_ rules and not according to the rules of some shepperds who lived 4000 years ago.
This more than anything will make it hard for a male pill to ever work, men know it and women know it: Women's drive is to have babies when it is best, when they've found a partner to help them with the decades it takes to raise a child, etc. Men's drive is (mostly) to have as many as possible with as many women as possible. Single women know this, and are thus less likely to trust a man's word that he's on the pill.
Of course... we are human, which means that evolutionary drive is not the only thing that matters, but it is there nevertheless. In the words of Steve Vai... we may be humans, but we're still animals.
If nicotine patches don't stick, how reliable is the adhesive on these going to be, and what happens when they fall off?
Come on now... lets get some more funny mods to outweigh that troll mod. This stuff is pure gold! As long as you commit incest with sincerity it's OK with the church
Much Madness is divinest Sense --
To a discerning Eye --
Much Sense -- the starkest Madness
It looks like somebody needs a nap.
Tobias addressed Sarah as "sister," but as a matter of respect not intended to denote immediate blood-relations. In fact, if you read the Book of Tobit you will find that Sarah's father is a cousin of Tobias's father, making Sarah one of Tobias's cousins, though it is not indicated how close or distant a cousin she is. The beauty of this Scriptural passage is that it teaches us how even marital sexuality is not to devolve into lust.
IC XC NIKA
Before making blanket declarations, read the third item here:
http://www.youaredumb.net/node/691
to speed things up here's the text:
>>
For people confused by the last line of yesterday's column, the short version is, three dipshit teens in rural Wisconsin got caught digging up a recently-buried corpse so that they could have sex with it. They'd bought condoms and everything, because embalming fluid, I presume, has nasty side effects on your pubescent crank. If you have an erection that lasts INTO THE AFTERLIFE, consult your doctor.
The incident raises all sorts of fascinating questions about the teens in question - did one of them come up with the idea? If so, what rhetorical powers must he posess to have talked his other two friends into it? What kind of forethought sends you to Wal-Mart for rubbers beforehand, without also providing the realization that digging up a body is a long, exhausting process?
But that's all trumped by the revelation that a judge dismissed the attempted sexual assault charges against them, because Wisconsin has no laws about necrophilia. Like the many sordid times in the past we've learned too late about states lacking laws on bestiality, it seems. I'm not sure if it's simple oversight, or a tricky legal boundary - a corpse is really neither a person nor property, after all.
Perhaps this case will cause the Wisconsin legislature to reconsider. But until then, Wisconsin is the place to be if you're into le rigor petit mortis. For the rest of us, however, given both this and the last time Wisconsin's sexual deviancies found their way into this column, I would suggest that whatever you do, DON'T ORDER THE VEAL.
O~ Him that studies revenge keeps his own wounds green. -- Francis Bacon
I keep seeing comments here to the effect that "no woman will or should trust a man that he is on the pill".
That's not the point of there being a male pill. The point is that men no longer have to trust women to be on the pill. If a guy is on the pill, he doesn't have to worry that the woman will say she is on the pill and then go off it, trapping him into supporting a child that he never wanted to gave. Imagine switching the gender roles there: say there was only male contraceptives, and the man says he's on the pill, but he wants a kid, so he stops taking his bill, and yay, now he's got a baby and a mom to take care of it, too! But what if the woman didn't want kids yet? "Well then... she should have been having sex, should she? It's her own fault for chasing cock," someone in this bizarro world might say.
But most of us (besides the abstinence-only types) would think that was a ridiculous response. She engaged in an activity trusting her partner's word that certain consequences would not occur because of measures he had taken. When he fails to take those measures, it's not her fault for trusting him and engaging in the activity, it's his fault for failing to keep his promises. Switch the pronouns here so it's a woman reneging on her word instead and the situation is not different, but plenty of people will harp on a man and say "well you should have kept it in your pants".
Even setting aside these issues of trust, the man being on the pill *and* the woman being on the pill is extra backup in case one of them should simply forget.
The point of this isn't that the burden of birth control can now be shifted to the men and women don't have to take the pill. The point is that now men have a way of making sure that they don't get someone pregnant that they don't want pregnant. If a woman also wants to make sure that she doesn't get pregnant when she doesn't want to, she can take her pill too. In a couple where both people don't want kids and so both are on the pill, extra protection in case one fails or is simply forgotten. In a couple where the woman may want a kid and try to trick the man into giving her one (and subsequently supporting it), or perhaps where the woman is just forgetful (as everyone can be sometimes), the man now has a means of protecting himself, instead of just relying on the woman.
-Forrest Cameranesi, Geek of all Trades
"I am Sam. Sam I am. I do not like trolls, flames, or spam."
And even then, with everything right, the testing, the right lube, etc. It can still develop a pinhole through the act of sex anyhow- and agains, you lose control over the situation, but have all the responsibility, etc.
Sad, isn't it, that people just think that using a condom will actually "protect" them; it'll do it most of the time- MOST OF THE TIME.
I am not merely a "consumer" or a "taxpayer". I am a Citizen of the State of Texas
From the first article:
"In men the drug would have to be taken as an implant rather than an oral pill as it is broken down in the digestive tract."
Good luck with that one. They better get it working in a gel form or no man will bother with this one either.
Just come up with a pill to make semen taste like chocolate.
"Don't worry babay, I'm on the patch..." except he's not. Oh man there will be some serious assholes breeding kids out there.
There is one aspect nobody is seeing with this - and it's the real advantage as far as I'm concerned.
Women have terribly complex hormonal systems. The female pill works by fiddling with that normally balanced system. Fiddling with the hormonal balance of a woman is generally not a good thing. In addition to the physical side effects and possible health risks involved, there are a whole raft of psychological repercussions.
On the other hand, male hormonal cycles are much less complex - and it doesn't even sound like this particular treatment is hormone based at all. For the sake of my relationship with my wife, I will happily be the one to submit to side effects rather than her taking the pill and possibly losing all desire for sex anyway.
As someone else posted, this kind of thing is intended for long term relationships that require contraception - not necessarily for casual accident prevention. For that, I recommend my Mandatory Vasectomy At Birth program (you're free to reverse the procedure with your own money at any time).
Culture is more than commerce
"Reverend, I... I think I'm coveting my own wife!"
You want the truthiness? You can't handle the truthiness!
I know this "Male Pill" at best won't hit the market for a few years, and possibly never will.. but just in case some of you have been living under rocks for the past 20 years, and take the 'Insightful' parent seriously -- Don't have unprotected sex with strangers. Wear a condom. You might have heard of STDs, though the topic doesn't seem to come up on /. very often for some reason.
If you know that both you and your lady have recently tested clean, then you can start worrying about birth control or Male Pill or whatnot.
http://cltracker.net -- powerful craigslist multi-city search
Technically the physis is where the bone grows, and the epiphysis is the area between the physis and the joint. The metaphysis is on the other side of the physis, heading towards the center of the bone, and the diaphysis is right in the center.
p hysis/epiphysis/joint.
Like so.
Joint Epiphysis/Physis/Metaphysis/Diaphysis/Metaphysis/
..........FULL STOP.
Women are only fertile for a couple days a month, and it's relatively easy to know when if you know what to look for. Morning temperature spike, change in the mucus texture, etc.
I gave a Natural Family Planning book to a friend/acquaintance as a wedding gift some years back, because she didn't want any children ever. (I finished highschool at a catholic school, and was thus exposed to the practice.)
Learn the rules so you know how to break them properly.
www.teslabox.com
thank you for your contribution
linky
GENERATION 26: The first time you see this, copy it into your sig on any forum and add 1 to the generation.
doesn't seem to know how to play.
If you want to win at the game, you must aquire a bunch of money. Lots of money. Then you will have absolutely no problem with the women. Other stuff may offer you temporary advantages, but hands down, money for the win. You want "the key" to being in that "very few" who get any? The key is solid gold. Black gold that is.
GENERATION 26: The first time you see this, copy it into your sig on any forum and add 1 to the generation.
With the money you'd save from not having to raise kids, you could hire someone. At union wages, no doubt.
GENERATION 26: The first time you see this, copy it into your sig on any forum and add 1 to the generation.
Robots. This wasn't an issue 10-12 years ago..but for those guys out there thinking this over right now, We're talking 2016-2018 here. We have vacuuming robots, we should see lawnmower robots in a decade or few.
GENERATION 26: The first time you see this, copy it into your sig on any forum and add 1 to the generation.
if you hadn't spent your days working 9-5 to raise kids, you could afford to retire on your own labour, including medical and living accomodations?
And if you can't afford to retire on your own labour AND you didn't have kids then maybe that's a GOOD thing?
GENERATION 26: The first time you see this, copy it into your sig on any forum and add 1 to the generation.
Thanks for the tip; I had forgotten about the blockquote tag. I agree with your drawing a comparison between bulimia and contraception, I've done so myself in other conversations about this subject.
IC XC NIKA
Every 5 years one of these stories about a male pill that is going to be available shortly hits the various media outlets. They have all failed human trials for the last 20 years.
It happened to my brother (girlfriend told him she was on the pill but was not), my grandfather (the pill + antibiotics = my uncle), four of my male friends (similar situations and 2 of them simply had drunken unprotected sex), and I've seen three of my female friends perpetrate it (one of them wanted to cash in on the rich guy she was dating, the other just wanted a child, and the third wanted to get married....guess what? they're all single mothers now, and their 'baby-daddies' have been granted the privilege of paying hundreds of dollars every month in child support).
Like Oswald said: young men, protect yourselves.
That *cannot* be emphasized enough.
No offense intended to the ladies; but guys, you simply cannot trust your woman to not get pregnant, because that's what female humans are designed to do. Whether by accident or design, you'll be stuck with the responsibility of a child you may or may not be ready to deal with. In many states, if you fail to pay your child support, you go to jail. Seriously.
Use condoms, use them right. Know the risks of what you're doing and BE CAREFUL. No condom, no sex. Period. EOF
Just do the math. For example, wikipedia says the condom has a 15% failure rate per year in actual real-world usage. That is a 0.85 probability of success. Suppose you are sexually active with fertile women from age 18 to age 53, for a total of 35 years. Raise 0.85 to the 35th power, and you get 0.0034, meaning a 0.34 percent chance of avoiding pregnancy. You're nearly certain to get a kid.
Oh, you'll do better. You'll get sterilized. Well, that's still a 5% risk of pregnancy. Taking a 5% risk is fine if the potential negative outcome is small. It's not fine when the result is an unwanted kid. Note that this doesn't cover the STDs, including permanent things like herpes, hepatitis, etc.
Suggestion: if you like sex, learn to like having a large family and learn to like a woman who will want to keep you.
Dear my. It sounds like "debtor's prison", which went out of style centuries ago, is now back in fashion.
... While I don't intend to feed the troll, am I the only one who's having Monty Python flashbacks here?
Every sperm is sacred.
Every sperm is great.
If a sperm is wasted,
God gets quite irate.
Feel free to sing along!
I put on my robe and wizard hat..
Let's see...
1. statistics (lottery payoff, familiarity with a few different distributions...)
2. basic microeconomics and macroeconomics
3. consumer contracts (car or home lease or loan, ISP service, hospital admission...)
4. sanitation (food safety, STDs, animal waste, surface contamination...)
Understand that, and you get to breed.
As everyone knows the most effective birth control is a simple click away to /. land, now if that could only be put in pill form.
I called it first I'm going to get all the money, no one else can have it.
It's my idea, mine I tell you, MINE.
Don't you hate glorious self-promotion? Visit my Blog
Actually the (female) pill can be taken that way for a few days at a time, if the user is sick and vomitting, or for some other reason can't keep it down. Better option than lapsing longer than you're "allowed" to and then having to abstain until next month.
Well put, Keytoe. And, ditto. This new therapy absolutely won't work for the "hooking up" crowd. But yeah, my wife also has tons of negative side effects from The Pill, and has pretty much run out of different brands to try. If this Male Pill were on the market, I'd go out and get it today, to see if just maaaaaybe it would be a better solution for us overall.
Bulimia and contraception? There's a comparison!
Let's see... bulimia, when untreated, makes you sick and kills you. Contraception is a relatively safe medication (compared to other medications, and to pregnancy risks).
Should we compare bulimia with other medications? Is my asthma medication an abuse of my respitory system? It certainly isn't natural, and it has worse side effects and risks than contraception. And don't say that asthma is a problem and pregnancy isn't - first of all, pregnancy can be a problem, second of all, birth control pills help with other reproductive problems, which is why my friend was on them when she was a virgin.
The comparison of cotraception and bulimia is stupid, and I hope you think about it long enough to understand that.
"What is Internet Explorer 7? Are you saying we can't access the normal internet?" - I love tech support. Really.
Well, where is it?
Warning: this article may contain humor, sarcasm, parody, and perhaps even irony. Read at your own risk.