Regulating Pregnancy

After decades of research to find a contraceptive pill, doctors have now been swamped with synthetic steroid hormones that work both ways: they will either prevent conception or encourage it, depending on how they are given. The first such product was announced by Chicago's G. D. Searle & Co. (TIME, May 6); this also had stop-and-go power over the menstrual cycle. Last week three drug manufacturers joined the New York Academy of Sciences in sponsoring a Manhattan conference which received progress reports on the varied and potent effects of several "progestagens" (progesterone-like hormones). Outstanding items:

DELALUTIN (E. R. Squibb & Sons' trade name for 17-alpha-hydroxyprogesterone) offers new hope for maintaining pregnancy in women with histories of repeated spontaneous abortions. Data dealt with 83 women who had had 353 earlier pregnancies, only 45 living babies; with the drug, they produced 56 live babies from only 83 pregnancies. Three Boston doctors reported 43 live babies from 59 pregnancies in diabetic women (including 41 severe cases). Delalutin must be injected.

NORLUTIN (Parke, Davis & Co.'s trade name for 19-nor-alpha-ethyniltestosterone) postpones menstruation "for as long as the physician may elect," reported gynecologists from the Medical College of Georgia. Such postponement is justified, they said, if a woman is made physically or emotionally ill by menstruation, and at specific times such as marriage, family crisis, sports competitions.

PROGESTERONE (the natural form) and the synthetic progestagens are female hormones. Given to men, they can both increase fertility and serve as temporary desexing agents, said Dr. Carl G. Heller after studies at Oregon State Penitentiary. In men with a low sperm count, the drugs drop the count to zero, but when the drugs are stopped, there is a rebound to more normal levels, increasing the likelihood of conception. In normal-count men, the drugs also reduce sexual desire, suggesting that they might be used along with psychotherapy in treating homosexuals.

ENOVID (Searle's name for norethynodrel) has shown impressive results as a contraceptive in Puerto Rican tests, reported Massachusetts' Physiologist Gregory

Pincus and Gynecologist John Rock. In San Juan, 265 women promised to take a tablet a day for 20 days each month. About 200 did so. Thus protected through 1,712 menstrual cycles, none became pregnant "despite regularly practiced copulation with no other type of contraception." The women who missed one to five tablets had two pregnancies in 282 cycles, while among those who missed six or more tablets there were three pregnancies in 151 cycles.

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