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A birth control pill for males is ready for human trials after researchers saw hopeful effects while studying its effectiveness on mice. According to New Scientist, this non-hormonal birth control was 99% effective in preventing mice from getting pregnant.
Past male contraceptives, which have been hormonal, haven’t made it past human clinical trials due to side effects. Non-hormonal contraception is more promising since there are fewer side effects and therefore less safety concerns.
“Safety is very important for birth control pills because people are not taking it for a disease, so they are less tolerant of side effects,” researcher Md Abdullah al Noman from the University of Minnesota in Minneapolis said.
Side effects were a concern during a 2016 study when researchers found that an injectable male contraceptive was nearly 100% effective in a study of 320 men. Though the results were promising, the injectable, which contained progestogen, caused them to experience muscle pain, acne, depression and other mental health diagnoses and increased sex drive.
Over a span of four weeks, Noman and his team gave mice a molecule called YCT529 on a daily basis and found that it caused their sperm count to drop significantly. They began to reproduce sperm normally within four to six weeks of not receiving the YCT529 molecule. No side effects were detected as well.
“When we went to even 100 times higher dose than the effective dose, the compound didn’t show any toxicity,” Noman noted.
The team tested over 100 molecules to find one that would block the retinoic acid receptor alpha (RAR-α) protein. Blocking this protein makes retinoic acid, which play a major role in sperm formation, less effective.
The drug has been licensed under Noman’s company, YourChoice Therapeutics. He presented his findings at the American Chemical Society Spring 2022 conference in San Diego, California on March 23. Human trials will begin later in 2022.
