Zap Away Your Baby Blues

There have been never-ending problems searching for a male birth control (other than condoms or vasectomies). Do women trust the men? Are men comfortable manipulating their testosterone levels?

Now it looks like ultrasound waves might the solution to this problem.

This method has been proven to work on dogs in Italy and researchers have been tentatively looking into it since the 1970s, but it’s only now with some results and a lot of money from Bill Gates’ foundation that they are seriously exploring this option.

“Our long-term goal is to use ultrasound from therapeutic instruments that are commonly found in sports medicine or physical therapy clinics as an inexpensive, long-term, reversible male contraceptive suitable for use in developing to first world countries.”

The theory is that men would get an ultrasound blast to their testicles twice a year and this would be sufficient to stop sperm production.

Elaine Lissner, from the Male Contraception Information Project (MCIP) in San Francisco, said that the question of whether fertility would return after multiple uses over years still remained.

So obviously they are still a long way off from the solution. But anything they can do to get closer to an answer and involve men more equally in family planning is great news.