In Memoriam: A thank you
Why say thank you? To show appreciation to all those who know how important birth control is in preventing unwanted pregnancies – not just today in our highly-developed, modern culture, but also in our culture’s past and in developing countries around the world.
The history of contraception is almost as old as human civilisation. It began with little vinegar-soaked sponges for women and animal intestines or something similar, as a predecessor of the modern condom, for men.
We say thank you to Wilhelm Mensinga for the invention and distribution of the diaphragm in the face of great opposition from 1880s societal norms and morals. We say thank you to Julius Fromm for the development of the only contraceptive that was available to men around 1915 and still is to this day – the condom.
We have Ludwig Haberlandt to thank for the discovery of hormonal contraception. We can thank the feminists Marie Stopes (UK), Margaret Sanger (USA) and Katharine McCormick (USA) for playing a vital role in its further development. Despite social ostracism and legal prosecution, it was pushed forward and in the end successfully established as a contraception, because of the work of Carl Djerassi, Gregory Pincus and John Rock. The birth control pill is now the most widely used form of contraception for women. The liberation of women, and the possibility from then on to decide for themselves when or if they wanted to become mothers, is one of the most magnificent advancements of humanity. Likewise, all variations of diaphragms and caps, copper or hormone based, are effective methods of contraception and deserve our recognition.
One should also acknowledge the natural forms of female contraception methods, such as the method both Kyusaku Ogino (Japan) and Hermann Knaus (Austria) developed independently of one another in the 1930s. In the first few years after the war and with the help of people involved in sex education, like Beate Uhse (Germany), it gained popularity as the simple and relatively reliable Knaus-Ogino Method (or Rhythm Method).
Thanks to Dr. Maria Hengstberger there is also the availability of her simple, but brilliant, Birth Control Necklace (adapted in the USA as Cyclebeads). It was modelled on the Knaus-Ogino Method, is easily used by illiterate people and available in over 30 developing countries.
A special thanks also goes to all the men, who with the help of a tiny cut, gave their partners some relief by getting a vasectomy. We also say thank you to everyone in advance, who will in future continue to strive to improve the existing contraception methods for higher reliability and for the good of those who use them.
Today we have numerous contraception methods available to us, helping men and women everywhere to plan their families. In just a few years the Bimek SLV will also be seamlessly integrated into modern contraception.
Photo: Wikipedia
_Julius_Fromm.jpg){kind=link}