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Sex in the laboratory: the Family Planning Association and contraceptive science in Britain, 1929–1959

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  28 June 2018

NATASHA SZUHAN
NATASHA SZUHAN*
Affiliation:
School of History, Australian National University, Canberra 0200, ACT, Australia. Email: [email protected].
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Abstract

Scientific and medical contraceptive standards are commonly believed to have begun with the advent of the oral contraceptive pill in the late 1950s. This article explains that in Britain contraceptive standards were imagined and implemented at least two decades earlier by the Family Planning Association, which sought to legitimize contraceptive methods, practice and provision through the foundation of the field of contraceptive science. This article charts the origins of the field, investigating the three methods the association devised and employed to achieve its goal of effecting contraceptive regulation. This was through the development of standardized methods to assess spermicidal efficacy; the establishment of quality, strength and manufacturing standards for rubber prophylactics; and the institution of animal trials to ensure the safety of specific contraceptives. The association publicized the results of its scientific testing on proprietary contraceptives in its annual Approved List of contraceptives. This provided doctors and chemists with a definitive register of safe and effective methods to prescribe.

Type
Research Article
Information
The British Journal for the History of Science , Volume 51 , Issue 3 , September 2018 , pp. 487 - 510
Copyright
Copyright © British Society for the History of Science 2018 

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Footnotes

Many thanks to Patricia Grimshaw and Joy Damousi for assisting me with the development and refinement of this research; Katrinka Szuhan for her critical editing; and the two anonymous referees for their invaluable comments, criticisms and suggestions, which infinitely improved this article. This work was supported by an Australian Government Research Training Scholarship.

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66 British Pharmacopoeia Commission Ad Hoc Committee on Spermicides Minutes, 15 September 1958, WL/SA/FPA/A7/22.

67 Baker, op. cit. (53), p. 189. Work on proprietary contraceptives began after the BCIC amalgamated with the NBCA and the North Kensington Women's Welfare Clinic medical committee conceived the germ of standardization and regulation in 1935.

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74 Baker and Bowler, op. cit. (68).

75 Letter, Gilmont Products Limited to J.R. Baker, 19 February 1935, WL/SA/FPA/A7/13.1.

76 Letter, Gilmont Products Limited to H. Holland, 1 March 1935, WL/SA/FPA/A7/13.1.

77 Gilmont Products Limited to Holland, op. cit. (76).

78 Letter, NBCA to Gilmont Products, 19 October 1938, WL/SA/FPA/A7/13.1.

79 Response, Gilmont Products to NBCA, 27 October 1938, WL/SA/FPA/A7/13.1.

80 Gilmont Products to NBCA, op. cit. (79).

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82 Gilmont Products to NBCA, op. cit. (79).

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121 Results of a New Series of Harmlessness Testing, op. cit. (117).

122 Results of a New Series of Harmlessness Testing, op. cit. (117).

123 Letter, E. Mears to M. Jackson, 30 October 1959, WL/SA/FPA/A7/16.

124 The medical sub-committee approached Voge in his capacity as a ‘rubber expert’ in 1934. He presented the committee with proof of the shoddy practices and products that were being sold on the open market, claiming that ‘only 55% [of condoms sold] were useable’. He explained the difficulties that prevented mass access to caps; they had to be handmade overseas and were very expensive, costing ten shillings per item. This interaction with Voge likely encouraged the association's interest in standardizing rubber goods. NBCA Medical Sub-Committee Minutes, Session Two, 28 July 1934, WL/SA/FPA/A5/88.

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128 Slaton, op. cit. (44), pp. 59–60.

129 This specification was later revised to ‘800% before ageing, and 720% after ageing’ by Schidrowitz to reflect a new conviction that this expectation was too high. NBCA Medical Sub-Committee and Ad Hoc Sub-Committee Minutes, 20 May 1937, WL/SA/FPA/A5/88.

130 Memorandum from P. Schidrowitz, 22 February 1937, WL/SA/FPA/A7/20; FPA general secretary to Schidrowitz, op. cit. (94).

131 Letter, P. Schidrowitz to FPA secretary, 14 January 1938, WL/SA/FPA/A7/20.

132 Letter, H. Holland to P. Schidrowitz, 30 October 1941, WL/SA/FPA/A7/20; letter, P. Schidrowitz to S.C.S. Robinson, 18 October 1948, WL/SA/FPA/A7/20; Results of ‘Dutch Cap’ Test by P. Schidrowitz, 28 April 1949, WL/SA/FPA/A7/20.

133 Memorandum from Schidrowitz, op. cit. (130).

134 NBCA Medical Sub-Committee Minutes, 16 October 1935, WL/SA/FPA/A5/88.

135 NBCA Medical Sub-Committee Minutes, op. cit. (134).

136 Letter, FPA acting secretary to P. Schidrowitz, 17 October 1941, WL/SA/FPA/A7/20.

137 Results of ‘Lambutt’ Cap Test by P. Schidrowitz, 30 April 1942, WL/SA/FPA/A7/20.

138 FPA Medical Sub-Committee Minutes, 20 May 1940, WL/SA/FPA/A7/1.

139 Letter, R.W. Vemes to H. Holland, 3 April 1941, WL/SA/FPA/A7/1, original emphasis.

140 Letter, FPA general secretary to A.R. Reid, 18 March 1954, WL/SA/FPA/A7/20.

141 Letter, R. Edwards to I. James, 17 October 1953, WL/SA/FPA/A7/20.

142 Edwards to James, op. cit. (141).

143 Approved List of Contraceptives: Specifications of Tests &c. of Rubber, August 1953, WL/SA/FPA/A7/20.

144 Letter, FPA general secretary to A.R. Reid, 14 October 1955, WL/SA/FPA/A7/20. The standardization of cap sizes was first attempted in 1935, when the medical sub-committee deemed Prentif Dumas cap sizes unsatisfactory. The committee suggested ‘Messer's Prentif possess themselves of a set of the ordinary Dumas Caps sizes small, medium and large, as made by Lambert, and use them as their standard’. NBCA Medical Sub-Committee Minutes, 13 January 1935, WL/SA/FPA/A5/88.

145 Telephone message from I. James, 8 January 1954, WL/SA/FPA/A7/20.

146 Test for Contraceptives on the Approved List, 25 October 1954, WL/SA/FPA/A7/20.

147 Test for Contraceptives on the Approved List, op. cit. (146).