If It Works ... Warming Male Testicles to Reduce Sperm Count

"There’s a reason that the testicles are outside a man’s body cavity.  The testicles need to be four degrees cooler than body temperature to make plenty of healthy sperm."

"The cremaster muscle contracts to pull the testicles closer to the body if they start to get too cold, and it relaxes to push them farther from the body to cool off if they get too warm."

"Prolonged exposure to a warmer temperature will make sperm die.  This will show up in a semen analysis as reduced motility [movement]."

Winfertility

 

In the late 1970s, Toulouse doctor and inventor Roger Mieusset theorized that applying mild heat to male testicles would succeed in diminishing the production of sperm. He tested underwear that lifts the testicles toward the body which had the effect of bringing heat to the testicles by two degrees. Sufficient, he discovered, to diminish the virility of fertility of a herd of rams, his test subjects. 

Male testicles must be dependent, hanging freely outside the body. Should those testicles be warmed to above 35C, sperm count realizes a dramatic drop. Any sperm count under one million sperm per millitre leads to infertility. It is, however, a temporary, reversible condition, to be used for no longer, it is recommended, than three years at a time. After which, given sufficient wait time, fertility levels should return to normal.

Dr. Mieusset himself prescribed his method -- with the use of a type of jockstrap he devised, lifting the testicles to rest against the body where they are gently warmed, instead of hanging loosely as nature designed them to for procreation and perpetuation of the species -- to a mere handful of men every year. His method, despite its success, was never funded for research trials, and thus failed to receive official recognition.

With the body in close contact to the testicles, heated by two degrees over what is considered normal, over three months when the warming underwear has been consistently worn for 15 hours daily, sterility is effected. In the current social consciousness of the unfairness of burdening women solely with the responsibility of ensuring unwanted pregnancy does not result from sexual congress, men are beginning to take some responsibility of their own; hence a return of the method.

French men are now assuming responsibility for birth control with the use of improvised jockstraps formulated to warm testicles to reduce their sperm count. The fact that no commercial options are yet available to men in the field of birth control, has led them to redress the gender imbalance with these contraceptive jockstraps. 

As a result, workshops have cropped up in cities like Toulouse, Paris and Nantes. The theory is that should a man determine it is time to discontinue use of the underwear, a return to normal can be affected following a few months of discarding use of the jockstrap. Effecting a reverse in the same time it took to diminish sperm count production.

Doctors' advice is that the devices not be worn regularly for over a three-year period, as a reflection of the lack of studies in the long-term impact of testicle-heating methods of contraception.

Of Mice, Men and Fertility

"Most female birth control pills work on the female sex hormones."

"Targeting the male sex hormone leads to a lot of side-effects such as weight gain, depression and increased risk of cardiovascular diseases."

"Men are less willing to take a birth control pill that has significant side effects. That's why we are targeting a non-hormonal pathway to developing a male birth control pill."

MD Abdullah al Noman, Ph.D.candidate, University of Minnesota

 

"That's very important -- that you knock out the target that you've achieved the desired effect but the mice are also viable and healthy."

"Of course, you have to be careful with this analysis because they are mice and not humans, but nevertheless the effect was very, very promising."

Gunda Georg, researcher, University of Minnesota

Clinical trials on humans may begin in the second half of the year. Photo by RGtimeline

Condoms and vasectomies are currently the sole options for men to select between as a form of birth control in the reality of no available oral contraceptives. Researchers in presenting their findings at the American Chemical Society's 2022 conference in San Diego, California noted that condoms are single-use, prone-to-failure devices, and vasectomies considered a permanent form of male sterilization with the potential of reversal, lacking guarantees.

 

In presenting their birth control pill for men, the scientists lauded it as a new, highly-effective non-hormonal contraception. Its efficacy was tested on mice, leading to a 99 percent success rate in the prevention of pregnancy. Human trials are proposed to begin the second half of 2022. The researchers explained that the pill is designed to target interactions with vitamin A, a vital compnent in fertility, instead of targeting hormones.

 

iStock

 

In avoiding testosterone, the male sex hormone, no side-effects were observed in the animal models. Following four weeks of oral administration of the compound -- YCT529 -- a significant reduction in sperm count was observed in the mice which led to the 99 percent success rate in preventing pregnancy, in the absence of any observable side-effects.

 

Once the treatments were stopped within four to six weeks the mice returned to normal levels of virility. Clinical trials on humans to be initiated in the second half of the year, though potentially risky, will lead to the conclusive trials, clearing the way for the formulation to be approved and eventually marketed as the first-ever available oral male-specific birth control pill.

A daily pill shows it can temporarily make mice sterile, and researchers hope to start human trials later this year..   -     Canva