EVERY morning for a year, Dan Glastonbury brushed his teeth then did something that is incredibly familiar to many women.
He took his daily dose of birth control.
Dan and wife Emily are one of around 200 couples who tested out a contraceptive gel known as NES/T.
It temporarily stops production of sperm, and therefore should prevent pregnancy — though the rate of reliability is yet to be determined.
The Glastonburys, who met ten years ago and married in 2018, started the trial in April 2019.
Dan, 37, from Manchester, tells Sun Health: “For 18 months, I kept a little bottle of gel with my toothpaste and rubbed a pump of it on to my shoulders.
“At the first check, I had 42million sperm per millilitre of semen and, over the course of six weeks, it dropped to less than a million, meaning it was impossible to get a woman pregnant.
“From that point, we had to commit to using the gel as our sole contraception for at least a year.”
Emily had no doubt she could trust her partner to take charge of this important job, but could you?
“One or two female friends voiced concern about whether you could rely on a man to put it on every day, but most thought it was amazing,” says Emily, 34.
Dan adds: “It only took seconds and I had no side effects. It was the perfect solution.”
Once a far-fetched idea, the gel is about to finish the second phase of a global medical trial.
‘The couples were very happy with it’
The third stage is due to start next year and, if successful, it could one day be prescribed on the NHS, if approved by the Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency.
Doctors say it would be a medical breakthrough, allowing men and women to take equal responsibility for birth control.
Saint Mary’s Hospital in Manchester and the University of Edinburgh have led the UK trials.
It is also being tested in the US, Chile, Zimbabwe, Italy, Sweden and Kenya.
Women have to use another form of contraception until the partner’s sperm count has fallen below 1 million/mL.
Dr Cheryl Fitzgerald, consultant in reproductive medicine at Saint Mary’s, says: “While we can’t share the results of phase two yet, the couples were very happy with it.”
NES/T works similarly to the female combined Pill.
“The Pill has two hormones in it: Progestogen, which switches off the pituitary gland (the bit of your brain that drives the ovaries to work) and oestrogen, to replace the oestrogen your ovaries would make,” says Dr Fitzgerald.
“This gel is the same principle, but the progestogen switches off the drive to the testes, stopping sperm production, and the second hormone is testosterone (to replace lost testosterone).”
Testosterone is important for male libido, bone health, hair growth, mood and more . . . much like oestrogen is vital for women.
Our sex life was as good as ever and there was no negative impact on my libido from the gel
Dan
Therefore it is necessary to replace testosterone to avoid unpleasant side effects.
But men can’t take it orally because of how it is metabolised by the liver, which is why NES/T is a gel absorbed into the skin.
Previous scientific teams have used injectable hormones and have trialled an oral pill.
Dr Fitzgerald claims the gel comes with minimal side effects and, once sperm production has dropped, it takes a while to return.
She says: “If you miss a dose, it would probably still be contraceptive and there’s also no chance of vomiting it back up again.”
She adds that love-making isn’t affected by the reduced sperm count: The majority of ejaculation is fluids from genital glands, including the prostate, not sperm.
The Glastonburys, who run a children’s education company, joined the trial after Emily spotted an advert on Facebook .
She says: “I’ve been on hormonal contraceptives since I was 16.
“I could never find one I was totally happy with. I got headaches and felt quite down.
“There’s also the mental load of remembering to take it, chasing up prescriptions and visiting clinics.
“I had a coil for three years but the process of having it fitted and taken out was horrendous.
“The idea of not having to deal with all of this was very appealing, but I had to get up the courage to ask Dan.”
Luckily, her husband had a special reason for wanting to test it.
He says: “I had cancer when I was 19 and, after I got the all clear, my mum bought me a book of 101 things to do before you die.
‘Perfect solution’
“One was to be in a medical trial, but most won’t allow it if you’ve had cancer. This was one I could do.
“I was wary and had reservations. I’d heard about a trial [dubbed the Elephant Man trial] that went wrong and people lost fingers and toes.
“Your imagination goes wild. What might happen down there?
“But the scientists reassured me they weren’t introducing a crazy new chemical, just giving me something your body already produces.”
The doctor told the couple the side effects would be less severe than the Pill.
Dan admits: “I’d never known there was a huge list of things women go through to stop them getting pregnant while men are oblivious. It opened my eyes to how they suffer in silence.”
Dan, who had sperm frozen during cancer treatment in case his fertility was damaged, says he had a mixed response to the trial from male pals.
He adds: “We were on a stag do and there was banter along the lines of, ‘Don’t come near me, I don’t want to catch it’.
“It was such a male response.”
Dan understood the impact taking charge of our contraception had on me
Emily Glastonbury
The couple say any contraception accidents would have been “happy” ones as they planned to try for a family. In fact, Emily got pregnant soon after their trial ended.
In fact, Emily fell pregnant soon after their trial ended.
Son Jack was born in February 2022, followed by daughter Arabella last month.
Dan says: “They predicted it would take 12 weeks [for sperm] to get back to normal, but it was quicker.”
Emily reckons there were unexpected benefits after coming off the Pill.
“I had 18 months getting to know my body and knowing when I ovulated,” she says.
“Dan understood the impact taking charge of our contraception had on me.”
And Dan, who says the “next step” is probably a vasectomy, insists: “Our sex life was as good as ever and there was no negative impact on my libido from the gel.
“This is the perfect solution for dads not wanting more children, and couples trying not to get pregnant.
“It’s so much easier and pain-free than an operation, and easier to reverse if circumstances change.”
Dr Fitzgerald says: “For 50 years, women have had all the responsibility but also the control.
“This gives men a chance to prevent pregnancy more confidently and, while this is still going to take years, not months, it’s incredibly promising.”
WHAT IS THE MALE PILL?
RUMOURS of a “male Pill” have been around for years, so where is the science at?
As well as the NES/T gel there are two types of tablet in the works. Dimethandro-lone undecanoate is a hormone pill which contains a steroid hormone and progesterone.
Researchers said in 2018 that in a trial of 100 men there was a “marked suppression” of hormones required for sperm production in subjects given the highest dose.
Meanwhile, YCT-529 is a hormone-free male pill developed by a US company. Early trials, presented in June this year, showed it was safe and well tolerated. It prevents sperm production by blocking access to vitamin A in the testes, which is essential for male fertility.
Meanwhile, a team at Weill Cornell Medicine, New York, have developed a drug that temporarily stopped fertility when tested on mice.
Taken shortly before sex, the contraceptive was 100 per cent effective in the first two hours. Its effects had worn off entirely a day later.
The drug deactivates an enzyme called soluble adenylyl cyclase and mice given it produced sperm that could not propel themselves forward.
It lays the foundations for a short-term drug for men to use instead of condoms.
