India tests the first long-lasting male contraceptive injection? How safe it is for men

The ICMR has recently tested a new method of contraception for men, and it looks promising. The injection-based contraceptive boasts high levels of efficacy and has significantly less side effects as compared to the other conventional methods used today. The phase-3 of the clinical trial, involved 303 candidates aged 25-40 years. The findings of the ICMR clinical trials were published in the international open access Andrology journal last month. The clinical trial were carried out at five different locations in the country. The centres for trials were located in New Delhi, Udhampur, Ludhiana, Jaipur and Kharagpur) and coordinated by the ICMR, New Delhi. The open-labelled and non-randomized, multi-centre hospital-based phase-III clinical trials were carried out after getting permission from the Drugs Controller General India (DCGI). 

It was approved by the institutional ethical committees of the respective centres. Under the study, a total of 303 healthy, sexually active and married men and their healthy and sexually active wives were included. These couples were selected for the trials after they came to the family planning clinic and department of urology or surgery for vasectomy or No Scalpel Vasectomy (NSV) were identified. During the trials, men were injected with 60 mg of Reversible Inhibition of Sperm under Guidance (RISUG).According to the study, the huge surge in world population, led to an urgent need to develop modern methods of male contraception for population control. The ICMR trials indicated that the RISUG method presented the highest effectiveness compared to all other contraceptives for both males and females. "The overall efficacy of RISUG with respect to achieving azoospermia was 97.3 per cent and based on pregnancy prevention was 99.02 per cent without any serious side effect," the study stated."In the history of contraceptive development, RISUG presents the highest effectiveness compared to all other contraceptives both male and female as they were at the threshold of induction into a mass contraception program," it said.  However, vasectomy is considered quite effective as a contraceptive measure.