история пилюли (Katherine McCormick)

Human reproduction was understood only in the 1800's when the scientists of that time discovered the female egg and its importance in reproduction. Earlier it was considered that men were the life creator while women were just the nest.

Katherine McCormick, Margaret Sanger, Dr. John Rock and Gregory Pincus are the names to reckon with, without their zeal and hard work the birth of contraceptive in the form of a pill would not have been possible. I would especially want to give kudos to Katherine McCormick.

Katherine McCormick was born in 1875 in a wealthy family in Dexter, Michigan. In 1904, she became one of the first women to graduate in a degree of science (biology) from Massachusetts institute of technology. She got married to Stanley McCormick, heir to the International Harvester Company fortune, who later suffered from schizophrenia. Believing that schizophrenia is hereditary Katherine McCormick vowed not to have any children. Therefore, contraceptives became her prime concern. She was involved in many philanthropic works and was also a women's right activist. McCormick believed that as much as the right to vote for women is important so is the right to control her body. She helped Margaret Sanger, a birth control activist by supporting her cause in many ways.


When her husband died in 1947, she became the sole inheritor of his property and a wealthy widow; she was 75 years of age then. Along with Sanger she envisioned a birth control method which could be taken in the pill form. Accordingly they met a scientist called Gregory Pincus who was equally interested in developing a birth control pill. Gregory was researching on progesterone and believed that it could be used as an anti-ovulent and could be developed as a contraceptive. He had already tested and proved progesterone to work on animals but could not move further with the research due to lack of funds. McCormick asked him to immediately restart the research and handed him a check of $40,000 which was quite a fortune that time.


Wanting the pill to be developed in her life time, McCormick moved from her Santa Barbara home to the east where the research lab was located. She time and again asked the scientist to hurry up the project. Dr. John Rock joined Pincus and together they did their first trial on human beings. The progesterone pills were tested on 50 women who administered them for 21 days with seven days break for menstruations. The human trial was a success, not even one out of the 50 women tested ovulated while on the pill. This laid the foundation of the birth of Enovid, the first contraceptive pill. In 1960 FDA approved Enovid as a birth control pill.



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