For as long as people have enjoyed sex, unwanted pregnancies have also plagued couples wishing to remain baby-free. In ancient times, around the first and second century BCE, there was a mysterious plant known as silphium, that was much-sought out by members of the public for its medicinal properties. Thought in popular legend to be a gift from Apollo, the god of medicine, it was used as a general cure-all for many remedies, including: sore throat, fever, warts, and all sorts of general aches and pains. However, as an added bonus, it also seemed to have significant contraceptive use amongst the population.
The true identity of the plant is not entirely known; many suspect it to be a member of the parsley family, which are known to have estrogenic properties, mimicking certain types of hormone therapy. It also might be related to a family of wild carrots, such as “Queen Anne’s Lace”, a type of contragestative agent. It can cause damage to the lining of the uterus, the endometrium, where the fertilized egg is usually implanted, thus putting a potential pregnancy at risk of not being carried to term. Regardless of its true identity, the plant was incredibly important to culture of the time. It was such a key stable in its trade that the city of Cyrene (in the location of present-day Libya) had symbols of the plant emblazoned on their currency. Sadly, the plant was so desired that it was farmed and harvested to the point of extinction just a few centuries before the common era.
Luckily, even though this contraceptive technique is no longer available for our own purposes, we do have a plethora of other methods of preventing pregnancy. These methods can be categorized into a few key routes of methods: sterilization methods, barrier methods, and hormonal treatments.
Sterilizations methods are exactly what they sound like— methods that involve either the male or female removing their ability to reproduce entirely. These feature either the male vasectomy, which involves the severing of the vas deferens and prevention of sperm from being ejaculated during sex, or the female tubal ligation, in which a woman’s fallopian tubes are blocked, sealed, or severed entirely from the uterus, preventing eggs from reaching the uterus. Both of these procedures halt the production of both sexes’ gamete cells permanently.
Barrier methods are perhaps the simplest to understand: sperm + egg = zygote, so if you don’t want zygote, don’t let sperm reach egg. There are a multitude of methods that fall into this category— male condoms, which prevent sperm from even entering the vaginal opening, as well as female condoms, diaphragms, and sponges, all of which prevent any sperm that enters the vagina from entering the cervix. Many commercially available barrier methods come with an added assurance: foam or liquid spermicide, chemicals which kill or otherwise hinder sperm cells before they can cause trouble anywhere.
At present, the only contraceptive methods that utilize hormonal therapy are available for the female half of the equation. These methods utilizes synthetic progesterone and/or estrogen, depending on the formulation, to mimic hormonal patterns typically produced during pregnancy. This causes the female body to “believe” that it is pregnant, for a time, and the ceasing of ovulation (egg production). This means that a woman should not have any eggs present in the fallopian tubes that could get her actually pregnant. These hormones can be delivered in a variety of methods: daily pills, dermal patches, implantations under the skin, vaginal rings, and with intrauterine devices, or IUDs. The latter devices can last for several years before they require replacement.
Most IUDs actually have another anti-pregnancy technology behind them: a small amount of copper coiled around the device. Surprisingly, copper is a rather potent spermicide. The entire reason behind this is not well-documented, but it is believed that copper reduces the oxidation processes and glucose consumption within the uterus, which is required for sperm cells to perform mobility processes, essentially halting them in their tracts.
Contragestion methods are different than contraception methods, as instead of preventing sperm and egg from meeting, they work against gestation, or the implantation of a fertilized egg into the endometrium. If you messed up and accidentally have a fertilized egg, your next step to prevent baby.exe from executing is to prevent that egg from getting too comfortable where it is. This typically is achieved via mifepristone, a synthetic drug which causes the degeneration of the endometrium, and a direct reduction of production of progestogen– the same hormone used in hormonal contraception. Without adequate levels of progesterone, fertilized eggs usually do not survive long, either due to an improperly prepared endometrium for egg implantation, or lack of protection from the body’s own immune system during early stages of pregnancy.
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