Speaker 1: Welcome to Invention, a production of I Heart Radio. Hey,
Speaker 1: welcome to Invention. My name is Robert Lamb and I'm
Speaker 1: Joe McCormick. In today's episode is going to be on
Speaker 1: a very important invention in the history of human health
Speaker 1: and medicine, the condom. Now obvious statement on the subject
Speaker 1: matter of today's episode, We're not going to be stigmatizing, uh,
Speaker 1: sex or birth control, but just wanted to give your
Speaker 1: heads up in case this came on in the car
Speaker 1: with the family or something and uh, it's uh and
Speaker 1: you want to avoid any awkwardness or whatever. But hey,
Speaker 1: if you want to keep listening, that's up to you. Yeah,
Speaker 1: as always, we're gonna tackle the subject matter with decorum
Speaker 1: here um. But but yeah, it seems like a great
Speaker 1: invention to tackle on the show because it's one way,
Speaker 1: as we'll discussed whether the history is interesting and at
Speaker 1: times not what we necessarily believe it to be in
Speaker 1: sort of like the pop culture level of just you know,
Speaker 1: vague understanding of of you know, the history oral truth
Speaker 1: regarding things. But then also we we have you know,
Speaker 1: obviously we thought, well this would be kind of a
Speaker 1: potentially sexy episode of Invention to you know, to what
Speaker 1: extent any episode of the Invention podcast is sexy. Um.
Speaker 1: I do think it is an important note, um, that
Speaker 1: that condoms, despite their their clinical history, still have a
Speaker 1: a sexy reality. Uh. And that's one of I mean,
Speaker 1: that's one of the key talking points on material about
Speaker 1: condoms uh, provided by organizations such as Planned Parenthood. Um.
Speaker 1: And we'll come back to that point in a bit. Yeah,
Speaker 1: that's a really good point actually, I mean, despite their
Speaker 1: important you know, their medical significance, I guess if you're
Speaker 1: trying to encourage widespread use of them to you know,
Speaker 1: stop the spread of s t S and and discourage
Speaker 1: unwanted pregnancies, you don't want to treat them as something
Speaker 1: that's like, you know, people associate with like a hospital
Speaker 1: or that you know, like you want people to think
Speaker 1: of them as something that's good to use in their
Speaker 1: recreational sexual activity. Yeah, exactly. I mean human sexuality is
Speaker 1: this mix of the biological, the things that we've evolved
Speaker 1: to do, and you know, basically environmental conditioning, but then
Speaker 1: there's all this cultural and societal conditioning as well. And
Speaker 1: so I think the understanding of the condom and the
Speaker 1: treatment of the condom and ultimately like communication about the
Speaker 1: condom and other you know, contraceptive um efforts as well,
Speaker 1: you know, have to like take those two movements into account. Yeah,
Speaker 1: making the condom sexy is a public health concern. Now,
Speaker 1: before we make it sexy, I guess we should just say,
Speaker 1: what what are the bare physical essential So the modern
Speaker 1: condom is a physical barrier or sheath used during sex
Speaker 1: to reduce the probability of both unwanted pregnancy and the
Speaker 1: spread of sexually transmitted infections. Uh. And of course there
Speaker 1: are other methods and technologies that people have used and
Speaker 1: do use today to try to prevent both of these things.
Speaker 1: But the condom is important to talk about because it
Speaker 1: was one of it has been one of the most
Speaker 1: widely used methods in history and around the world today
Speaker 1: for both of these reasons. Absolutely. Again, one of the
Speaker 1: other important things that we'll come back to is that,
Speaker 1: like the condom doesn't you know, exist all on its
Speaker 1: own within the uh you know, the the the the
Speaker 1: tool chest of contraceptive methods. It can be used, can
Speaker 1: and should be used alongside these other methods as well,
Speaker 1: which we'll get to. Yeah, And so there are two
Speaker 1: main versions of the condom that have been used throughout
Speaker 1: the years. Uh. That I think the terminology that will
Speaker 1: use is the internal condom and the external condom. The
Speaker 1: internal condoms sometimes called the female condom, the external condoms
Speaker 1: sometimes called the male condom. They essentially performed the same
Speaker 1: job that they're worn differently. Uh. And I also want
Speaker 1: to go ahead and side at the top of this episode.
Speaker 1: Probably my main source of for the research today. It's
Speaker 1: an excellent paper on this subject by Jean Jacques Amy
Speaker 1: and Michel Thiery called the Condom A Turbulent History from
Speaker 1: the European Journal of Contraception and Reproductive Reproductive Healthcare. From
Speaker 1: that was a really good resource, especially because it corrects
Speaker 1: some previously widely circular related myths about the history of
Speaker 1: the condom. That's right. There are a lot of just
Speaker 1: like basic lists of facts on the internet that that
Speaker 1: you can you know, they're not necessarily dangerous facts or anything,
Speaker 1: but but they're not necessarily correct. And there is a
Speaker 1: lot of stuff too that we'll get into some examples
Speaker 1: of this where there'll be a story about the origin
Speaker 1: of the condom and it sounds perhaps it sounds believable,
Speaker 1: but is there any evidence for it? Uh, we'll discuss
Speaker 1: the details as we proceed here. Yeah. So always on
Speaker 1: this show, when we talk about an invention, we'd like
Speaker 1: to ask the question of what came before this invention,
Speaker 1: And the answer here is well, a lot of s
Speaker 1: t I S and unwanted pregnancy, that's right. Uh. You
Speaker 1: know it's as humans, as Homo sapiens, were continuous breeders
Speaker 1: rather than seasonal breeders. It's the same with with with
Speaker 1: our fellow apes species. Um. There's no breeding season for us. Um. However,
Speaker 1: various environmental factors do influence reproductive rates, so in a
Speaker 1: way you can argue that this can produce so called
Speaker 1: hidden human breeding seasons. Elsewhere in the animal kingdom, we
Speaker 1: have seasonal breeders, of course, Um, there's a certain period
Speaker 1: of the year during which they will breed, and then
Speaker 1: they are also operative, opportunistic breeders who will breed during
Speaker 1: favorable environmental conditions. But humans and other apes can make
Speaker 1: year round and we've been this way for quite a while.
Speaker 1: You know, we've been biologically stable as a species for
Speaker 1: roughly a hundred thousand years in this regard, and sex
Speaker 1: among our ancient ancestors was still sex, right, meaning that
Speaker 1: like there was a lot of it going on, and
Speaker 1: there were a lot of things that sometimes I feel
Speaker 1: like people can strangely think of as like recent additions
Speaker 1: to human life and culture like S T I S.
Speaker 1: Have you ever encountered this belief that it's like that's
Speaker 1: a thing that happened recently. There's yeah, in a in
Speaker 1: a weird way like part of it in terms of
Speaker 1: like like just nostalgia for the past, like the recent
Speaker 1: past like this, Like I've encountered like a vague idea
Speaker 1: that like during the nineteen sixties that were not STDs
Speaker 1: or something, or that certain STDs didn't exist. Um. And
Speaker 1: in granted, you know, there's a you know, there's an
Speaker 1: ebb and flow to to our to both you know,
Speaker 1: illnesses and diseases that are affecting us and more to
Speaker 1: the point, our awareness of said diseases. Um, you know,
Speaker 1: in addition to the the actual spread of them. Uh.
Speaker 1: But but yeah, I've seen like shades of this in
Speaker 1: terms of recent history. I don't know if I've encountered
Speaker 1: it in terms of ancient history, um, in part because
Speaker 1: it just seems obvious that there have always been ailments
Speaker 1: of this sort. Well, I just think I think it's
Speaker 1: part of a sort of like naive moralizing that that
Speaker 1: suggests like, uh, you know, sexual morality is not what
Speaker 1: it used to be in the past, was better, and
Speaker 1: therefore it's like this this fantasy that people weren't having
Speaker 1: sex in the past, and part of that fantasy is
Speaker 1: that there wasn't you know, any of the negative consequences
Speaker 1: that can come from unprotected sex. So so kind of
Speaker 1: this um like magic cold belief that that sexually transmitted
Speaker 1: diseases are a product of not only um uh immoral behavior,
Speaker 1: but a product of recent immoral behavior. Yeah, the false
Speaker 1: kind of moral degeneracy theory. You know, the present of
Speaker 1: kids are so bad these days now in terms of
Speaker 1: ancient people though, according to David Buss, professor of psychology
Speaker 1: at the University of Texas, who wrote a book titled
Speaker 1: The Evolution of Desire Strategies of Human Mating, and he
Speaker 1: points out that we don't know for sure what sex
Speaker 1: was like for for you know, ancient humans. But he
Speaker 1: points out, you know, something very much in line with
Speaker 1: our past stuff to blow your mind discussions on pain.
Speaker 1: You know that that that human sexuality is a mixture
Speaker 1: of the biological and the social Uh. You know that
Speaker 1: there's a part of it is like what the body
Speaker 1: is doing and how we're we're reacting to the sensations.
Speaker 1: But then on top of that, as with most things
Speaker 1: that conscious humans engage in, there is that conscious understanding
Speaker 1: and how that changes what is going on in addition
Speaker 1: again to culture and society and societal pressures. Now, as
Speaker 1: we've also discussed on stuffable in your mind before, uh,
Speaker 1: other organisms deal with reproduction and environmental demands, but humans
Speaker 1: alone would seem to exercise conscious understanding of and to
Speaker 1: an extent control of their reproductive anatomy. We're also the
Speaker 1: most advanced tool users on the planet, so it's become
Speaker 1: as no surprise that we eventually turned our toolmaking and
Speaker 1: using skills to our own genitals and an attempt to
Speaker 1: manage our desires the emotional aspects of sexuality and the
Speaker 1: purely reproductive side of the act. And again that's just
Speaker 1: the reproductive side of the equation, because humans have also
Speaker 1: had to fight off an impressive parasite load but throughout
Speaker 1: their history, throughout their history, and and to deal with
Speaker 1: the risks of diseases that spread through, among other things,
Speaker 1: sexual activity. So it is definitely not effect that sexually
Speaker 1: transmitted infections are recent. This is something we've been dealing
Speaker 1: with as far back as as possible to imagine, right,
Speaker 1: and and and this is another thing that should go
Speaker 1: without saying, but I feel often needs to be stressed. Uh,
Speaker 1: sexually transmitted diseases are not merely a human thing like
Speaker 1: animals have sexually transmitted diseases as well. This is just
Speaker 1: part of being an organism. Yeah. Now, in terms of
Speaker 1: of ancient accounts of sexually transmitted diseases to back the
Speaker 1: sort of thing up, uh that there are a lot
Speaker 1: of examples. One of the papers that we were looking
Speaker 1: at in this comes from Frangio at All titled History
Speaker 1: of Anereal Diseases from Antiquity to the Renaissance, and it
Speaker 1: points out that some of our oldest records include details
Speaker 1: of the neereal disease quote clay tablets from Mesopotamia, Egyptian papyri,
Speaker 1: along with mythology, paintings of erotic scenes and the presence
Speaker 1: of prostitutes, gives a sufficient information to assume that some
Speaker 1: form of urethral and vaginal discharge and also herpes genitalis
Speaker 1: were present among people at that time. And that these
Speaker 1: diseases were considered a divine punishment. Oh yeah, bringing the
Speaker 1: magic into it, right, And this has always been a
Speaker 1: you know, the history of of humans understanding their diseases
Speaker 1: and trying to understand their diseases and laying on this
Speaker 1: level of society and culture. But on top of that,
Speaker 1: you you look back to the writings and the work
Speaker 1: of physicians throughout history, and the Greeks, the Chinese, the Arabic,
Speaker 1: the Arabics, Indian physicians as well, all wrote about this
Speaker 1: sort of thing. And I think syphilis alone is a
Speaker 1: great study and just how pervasive and influential a given
Speaker 1: venereal disease can be, namely from at least the fifteenth
Speaker 1: century onward in Europe. We've talked about this on again
Speaker 1: our other podcast, Stuff to Blow your Mind in the past,
Speaker 1: about just how widespread syphilis was, how difficult, if not impossible,
Speaker 1: to suppress, and just you know, to the extent to
Speaker 1: which it it affected society. It trickled down into culture too,
Speaker 1: and we've talked about everything. We even talked about the
Speaker 1: ways it may have influenced some vampire lore. Oh yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: there's some strong theories for that as well. But of
Speaker 1: course without germ theory, there's only so much you can
Speaker 1: do to control STDs, right, and the efforts are going
Speaker 1: to range from herbal treatments which you know may or
Speaker 1: may not have have you know, some degree of validity,
Speaker 1: but two things that are just outright magic and superstition,
Speaker 1: as well as plenty of classist and misogynistic treatments of
Speaker 1: venereal disease. Like even in the twentieth century, as we
Speaker 1: learn more and more about how these diseases actually work,
Speaker 1: you still saw like a lot of pretty awful propaganda,
Speaker 1: especially or at least the main examples I've seen avator
Speaker 1: from US the U. S. Military during the Second World War,
Speaker 1: for the First World War, that that play into the
Speaker 1: notion of monstrous females being like the sole domain of
Speaker 1: sexually transmitted diseases. Yeah, the idea that there are these
Speaker 1: immoral women out there that you don't want your you know,
Speaker 1: your young soldiers going off to war consorting with, and
Speaker 1: you warn them about it, almost treating them like their vampires, right,
Speaker 1: and then ultimately like placing all the blame on on
Speaker 1: one gender. But throughout history, you know, they've also been
Speaker 1: these larger scale social movements, um, you know, involving generally abstinence,
Speaker 1: and they can't stuff the spread of these illnesses as well,
Speaker 1: because humans continue to engage in this sort of sexual behavior,
Speaker 1: this kind of sexual behavior they've evolved to engage in,
Speaker 1: and society. Society continues to provide outlets of accessibility, be
Speaker 1: it in war, prostitution, etcetera. Plus, you also have plenty
Speaker 1: of venerial diseases that can be acquired via other other
Speaker 1: methods such as, uh, the you know the public baths
Speaker 1: in history, you know, but before we really knew how
Speaker 1: to properly maintain them. Uh, and then am ancient romans?
Speaker 1: Yeah that that that that sort of thing. And then
Speaker 1: also in some times in places this sort of these
Speaker 1: baths provide a social outlet for sexuality as well. Uh.
Speaker 1: And then there are other cases where they're gonning to
Speaker 1: be other public health issues that make the spread of
Speaker 1: these illnesses possible. And then also syphilis is an example
Speaker 1: of an STD that can be spread uh congenitally as well,
Speaker 1: so it can spread from a mother to an offspring. Okay,
Speaker 1: So obviously sexually transmitted infections and unwanted pregnancies or like
Speaker 1: huge issues that people have been trying to avoid going
Speaker 1: back millennia. Uh So this is one. This is I
Speaker 1: guess where we should bring in the condom, and maybe
Speaker 1: we should take a break, and then when we come
Speaker 1: back from the break, we can explore the question of
Speaker 1: who invented the condom? Alright, we're back. We're discussing the
Speaker 1: invention of the condom. We have not yet gotten to
Speaker 1: the part in the episode we will make condom sexy
Speaker 1: because we're gonna be talking about animal bladders here for
Speaker 1: a little bit. Well, uh so we're asking the question
Speaker 1: who invented the condom. We like to ask this about
Speaker 1: any invention we talked about, and this is one of
Speaker 1: those cases where we have no idea. Uh there is
Speaker 1: no known inventor of the condom. So the use of
Speaker 1: animal tissues such as bladders like the swim bladders of fish,
Speaker 1: or the bladder of goats or sheep, or intestines or
Speaker 1: scum like the intestines of sheep. Often, uh these types
Speaker 1: of animal membranes and tissues have been used as protective
Speaker 1: barriers during intercourse going way back into history, and we
Speaker 1: don't know for sure how far back. Our first direct
Speaker 1: physical evidence of the use of an animal membrane as
Speaker 1: a as a condom is from the seventeenth century, but
Speaker 1: that's just we have accounts going back farther than that.
Speaker 1: That's just the oldest example we have in the archaeological record,
Speaker 1: and we'll talk more about that later. Um So, it's
Speaker 1: an ongoing debate among historians and archaeologists whether anything like
Speaker 1: a modern condom was ever widely used in the ancient world,
Speaker 1: and if if it was used to what extent. There
Speaker 1: were believed to be tons of different methods of sexual
Speaker 1: protection in the ancient world. Of course, there was a
Speaker 1: lot of use of amulets and magic spells and potions
Speaker 1: and things like that. We mentioned a little bit about
Speaker 1: herbal remedies before. There was the use of of pessaries sometimes,
Speaker 1: which would be like an object placed inside vagina. In
Speaker 1: an eighteenth century b CE medical papyrus from ancient Egypt,
Speaker 1: there is the claim that quote crocodile dung mixed with
Speaker 1: honey and placed in the vagina of a woman prevents conception,
Speaker 1: which that sounds gross. That might have actually worked some
Speaker 1: of the time. I don't know. Maybe I don't know
Speaker 1: that there have been any modern studies into this particular.
Speaker 1: We're not advocating, but but yeah, what about condoms? What
Speaker 1: about a protective physical barrier in the form of like
Speaker 1: a sheath. So I've come across some claims that several
Speaker 1: types of protective sheaths in the form of both internal
Speaker 1: and external condoms were used by cultures like the ancient Egyptians,
Speaker 1: the Romans, the Chinese, the people of New Guinea, and
Speaker 1: the people of Japan and some others. As of just
Speaker 1: one example of a claim like this I've come across.
Speaker 1: I was reading apart from a book called The Humble
Speaker 1: Little Condom of History by Anya Collier, and she writes
Speaker 1: that before the fifteenth century in China, quote Chinese condoms
Speaker 1: yin Chia were ultraly made from oiled silk paper and
Speaker 1: lamb intestines. And she doesn't specify how far back this
Speaker 1: is thought to have been used. She does say before
Speaker 1: the fifteenth century, but she writes that this condom only
Speaker 1: covered the top of the penis, and this is actually
Speaker 1: common with a lot of models throughout history. Is not
Speaker 1: common in condoms today, but many models, especially some you'd
Speaker 1: see later in Europe, would only cover the glands. And
Speaker 1: this was employed primarily with an understanding that it would
Speaker 1: prevent pregnancy. It was not aimed at preventing disease, according
Speaker 1: to a. Collier. But whether each of these individual claims
Speaker 1: about condom use or earlier than the fifteenth century are
Speaker 1: correct or not, it's clear that some use of physical
Speaker 1: barrier prophylaxis does go back into the fog of history,
Speaker 1: and there is no known inventor of the condom. Some
Speaker 1: of the people who have been given credit as the
Speaker 1: inventor are definitely not the inventor. And of course I
Speaker 1: think all of this makes sense because ejaculation would have
Speaker 1: been identified as a key event uh in um inmating
Speaker 1: in pregnancy, and therefore a physical barrier between the opening
Speaker 1: of the male urethra, if not the entire penis itself
Speaker 1: and female genitals would seem a likely tactic that that
Speaker 1: even you know, ancient people's would have realized. Now, I
Speaker 1: want to talk about mythology, because there are some indications
Speaker 1: of something like a condom in uh in the mythology
Speaker 1: of the ancient world. Here's an example that came up
Speaker 1: in the paper by by Ommi and Tieri. Uh something
Speaker 1: like a condom appears in a fascinating Greek myth as
Speaker 1: told by Antoninist liberalists in the second century CE in
Speaker 1: his work Metamorphoses. Now, this is a prose work that's
Speaker 1: a lot like Ovid's poetry work The Metamorphoses. It's a
Speaker 1: collection of tellings of Greek myths in which God transforms
Speaker 1: a person into something else. And this particular story concerns Minos,
Speaker 1: the king of Crete, and his wife Pacific. So in
Speaker 1: liberalists version of the story, Minos and specific or married
Speaker 1: and they couldn't conceive a child because Minos was cursed.
Speaker 1: His semen was apparently full of snakes and scorpions, which
Speaker 1: which would kill any woman that he had sex with.
Speaker 1: So on. On that alone, it sounds like you could
Speaker 1: look at that is either a possible um you know,
Speaker 1: magical version of sexually transmitted disease like his his semen
Speaker 1: causes some sort of illness that eventually is painful and
Speaker 1: could even you know, bring death. Um Or of course
Speaker 1: it could just be a treatment of infertility. To say that,
Speaker 1: you know, again kind of a mythological exaggeration. Uh. Yeah.
Speaker 1: The method they're going to propose for fixing the problem
Speaker 1: in this story, I think would not really correlate with
Speaker 1: it being modeled on a disease, it would correlate more
Speaker 1: with it just being like a magical convention in the story.
Speaker 1: But then again, even if this is inspired by some
Speaker 1: kind of real experience with the sexually transmitted infection or something,
Speaker 1: you can still see how it could get sort of
Speaker 1: warped and acquire different mythical baggage over time. But anyway,
Speaker 1: so in the story, he's got this problem. His semen
Speaker 1: is full of snakes, it's got scorpions, it's got centipedes.
Speaker 1: It's a problem. So to get around the problem, King
Speaker 1: Minos is instructed to put the bladder of a goat
Speaker 1: into another woman's vagina. I think this is uh procris
Speaker 1: and uh, and then to have sex with her. And
Speaker 1: after that all the snakes and scorpions would be gone,
Speaker 1: so he and Pacific could safely have sex and conceive.
Speaker 1: And the implication is that the goats bladder here serves
Speaker 1: as a protective barrier for this other woman so that
Speaker 1: the serpents and the scorpions don't harm her. Now this
Speaker 1: is straight because you can almost I don't know, could
Speaker 1: they not think about other ways around this problem? Yeah,
Speaker 1: I mean, on one level, it does sound like you
Speaker 1: could also be an example of uh, you know, there
Speaker 1: being some sort of situation, some sort of sexual situation
Speaker 1: that needed to be addressed, and then the solution was here,
Speaker 1: used this uh, this bladder uh in intercourse as some
Speaker 1: sort of a barrier. And then perhaps you just have
Speaker 1: mythological explanations and story making on top of that, almost
Speaker 1: as if like the people generating the stories don't understand
Speaker 1: and or don't care what the original reason was, you know,
Speaker 1: or it could just be a mythical invention. Certain, but yeah,
Speaker 1: um yeah, it's interesting to consider how it could have
Speaker 1: been inspired by some real practice. Like basically, if nothing else,
Speaker 1: it shows that during the second century CE, the idea
Speaker 1: of using a physical barrier during a sex act was
Speaker 1: at least in the zeitgeist. Right. It's it's at least
Speaker 1: possible indication that there could have been some consciousness about
Speaker 1: this in the culture. Basically, this would be the form
Speaker 1: of an internal condom. Now, I do want to say
Speaker 1: something real quick though about the you know, about the
Speaker 1: use of intestines and and bladders in all of this.
Speaker 1: I feel like it seems gross to people today. It
Speaker 1: can seem gross to us today, and I think a
Speaker 1: lot of that is because we are so many of
Speaker 1: us anyway, are removed from the culture of butchery and
Speaker 1: can easily forget that animal bladders could be used for
Speaker 1: a number of different things. A dried animal bladder was
Speaker 1: essentially a balloon, well, and these membranes and tissues were
Speaker 1: used for all kinds of things in the ancient world.
Speaker 1: I mean, this isn't the only use of a goat's
Speaker 1: bladder or sheep intestine in the ancient world. They were, uh,
Speaker 1: they were very versatile materials that were used in all
Speaker 1: kinds of consumer goods. And we'll come back to this
Speaker 1: in a bit, Okay. So another thing that Ammy and
Speaker 1: Thierry point out in their paper is that a lot
Speaker 1: of sources point to a sixteenth century Italian physician and
Speaker 1: anatomist named Gabrielli Fallopio as as the person who published
Speaker 1: the earliest confirmed description of the condom and so Filippio
Speaker 1: lived fifteen twenty three to fifteen sixty two, and he
Speaker 1: was very influential in his discoveries about the human body
Speaker 1: and in overturning some of the misconceptions of physicians from
Speaker 1: antiquity like Galen and through dissection of cadavers, Filipio made
Speaker 1: a lot of important observations about about the human head,
Speaker 1: about the ears, and about the reproductive organs. Uh he
Speaker 1: discovered the tubes that travel between the ovaries and the uterus,
Speaker 1: now known as phillopian tubes. But uh I Mean and
Speaker 1: Terry dispute this tendency to give Filipio credit for the
Speaker 1: first published description of the condom, and they disputed in
Speaker 1: multiple ways. First of all, there is at least one
Speaker 1: known example, much earlier than this, of a published description
Speaker 1: of a condom. In the tenth century, the Persian physician
Speaker 1: al A Kawani published a treatise in which he advocated
Speaker 1: the use of an animal's gall bladder to cover the
Speaker 1: penis during sex, and this was understood to be for
Speaker 1: the purpose of preventing pregnancy. But Amy Interiery also dispute
Speaker 1: the Filipio ever described a condom as a barrier to
Speaker 1: be used during intercourse. Well, then what's this dispute about. Well,
Speaker 1: Filipio did definitely right about a thing that covers the penis.
Speaker 1: According to Ammi Interieri, Philippio wrote about a sheet of
Speaker 1: fabric that would be filled with a concoction of wine
Speaker 1: and wood shavings and bits of copper and antler ashes
Speaker 1: and mercury precipitate whatever that is, um, and that by
Speaker 1: placing this sheet full of stuff over the glands, it
Speaker 1: would protect a man from contracting syphilis. However, what the
Speaker 1: authors here point out is that he actually doesn't recommend
Speaker 1: using this during intercourse. He recommends using it after intercourse
Speaker 1: has already taken place. Okay, Well, that that makes a
Speaker 1: lot more sense given all the details of the ingredients
Speaker 1: that are placed within. Yeah, and so obviously that's not
Speaker 1: a condom. That's just more like a bizarre home remedy. Uh.
Speaker 1: If Philippio claimed that men had used this method and
Speaker 1: none of them ever got syphilis, I'm suspicious of that claim. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I mean, especially given how confusing syphilis, uh, you know,
Speaker 1: historically was to h to document. It was called the
Speaker 1: great imitator, for example, because it could was so often
Speaker 1: misdiagnosed as other things, and then it can of course
Speaker 1: go dormant for long periods of time and seem as
Speaker 1: if it is cured. Yes. So, even though this doesn't
Speaker 1: actually describe the use of a condom during intercourse, some
Speaker 1: historical writings do indicate that by the seventeenth century, animal
Speaker 1: membrane and linen condoms were being used in various places
Speaker 1: throughout Europe. So by the seventeenth century, there's definitely their
Speaker 1: writings all over the place indicating people are using these things.
Speaker 1: They're definitely in fashion by then. And another thing is
Speaker 1: the physical evidence here. So we mentioned a while back
Speaker 1: that the earliest surviving physical evidence of a condom goes
Speaker 1: back to the seventeenth century. What is this physical evidence. Well,
Speaker 1: in the nineteen eighties archaeologists found sheep intestine condoms in
Speaker 1: an excavation of an English latrine pit from the sixteen forties.
Speaker 1: So it looks like they were used and then thrown
Speaker 1: in the latrine sometime between sixteen forty two and sixteen
Speaker 1: forty six. The pit was actually covered in sixteen forty seven,
Speaker 1: and we know that. Uh and this was at a
Speaker 1: keep of Dudley Castle in West Midlands, England. Uh So
Speaker 1: if anybody's been there and has seen the famous condom
Speaker 1: pit right in, let us know. Now this brings us
Speaker 1: to the obvious question condom, Like, where does the word
Speaker 1: itself come from? This is a huge debate all on
Speaker 1: its own. Yeah, exactly and uh and and we should
Speaker 1: note that you know that there's certainly the myth out
Speaker 1: there of the British doctor Condom or Colonel Condom or
Speaker 1: colonel yeah who Reverend Condom. Well, I didn't run across reverend,
Speaker 1: but Captain. I mean, as long as we're we're just
Speaker 1: clearly making him up. His holdiness the Pope Condom, Well,
Speaker 1: he said, well, probably not that one, but he was
Speaker 1: said to have lived in the seventeenth century, uh in
Speaker 1: England under the reign of Charles the Second, and he's
Speaker 1: pointed out by Ammy and Terry in Condoms of Turbulent History.
Speaker 1: There there's seemingly no basis for this at all, but
Speaker 1: there is a whole lot of conflicting stories on where
Speaker 1: the term condom comes from. Just be beyond this story.
Speaker 1: So if it's not from a non existent English name,
Speaker 1: and that's the thing, like condom is not even an
Speaker 1: English name from that time period, then where did it
Speaker 1: come from? Well, they point to a few plausible theories.
Speaker 1: It could come from the verb um condary, which has
Speaker 1: numerous meanings, including to protect, to protect or to sheath,
Speaker 1: or the corresponding noun condus, which means one who stores
Speaker 1: that which preserves or a receptacle. Or It also could
Speaker 1: derive from the Italian word guantan, which more specifically is
Speaker 1: it's a Phoenician variant gondum, meaning a gauntlet or glove. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I love really. Another thing that's great in this paper
Speaker 1: is a documentation of many of the euphemisms that people
Speaker 1: have had for condoms throughout the centuries, especially in the
Speaker 1: eighteenth century, you had these great One thing about euphemisms
Speaker 1: for condoms is that almost every national culture puts the
Speaker 1: name of another national culture in the euphemism for the condom.
Speaker 1: So like the the French sometimes called them the English
Speaker 1: writing code, and the English sometimes called them quote French
Speaker 1: letters letters What does that mean? The letters apparently comes
Speaker 1: from a common word meaning envelope, so like you know,
Speaker 1: the letters would be the envelope. So it's like saying
Speaker 1: the French envelope. Now I wonder where this comes from?
Speaker 1: It is it is it perhaps tied to the invention
Speaker 1: actually you know, entering into the country from say France
Speaker 1: or or from England. You know, are they actually contributing
Speaker 1: the source or is it like this is the kind
Speaker 1: of it's useful, but it's the kind of thing that
Speaker 1: those French would have come up with or correspondingly. This
Speaker 1: is a very useful invention, but clearly the English did
Speaker 1: this there. I wish there was a name for this.
Speaker 1: I know there might be a name for it, I
Speaker 1: don't know of. Yeah, this general phenomenon of um applying
Speaker 1: the name of another country to an object or practice
Speaker 1: doesn't necessarily come from there, right or you know, another
Speaker 1: way of looking at is that since for so long
Speaker 1: contraception has been you know, unfairly thrust solely upon on
Speaker 1: females in these situations, I guess it's possible that it's
Speaker 1: it could be due to um men traveling to another country,
Speaker 1: say French traveling to England, English traveling to France, uh,
Speaker 1: in a military scenario or outside of a military scenario,
Speaker 1: and then it is, you know, they attribute it to
Speaker 1: the nation in which the females are introducing them to
Speaker 1: the technology. Oh that's interesting. Yeah, but that's that's merely
Speaker 1: my guesswork. Okay. So by the nineteenth century, condoms had
Speaker 1: definitely become very popular in Europe for both contraception and
Speaker 1: prophyl access against infections, but they weren't without problems. That
Speaker 1: the most popular condoms were these skin condoms. There were
Speaker 1: linen condoms to There were various materials used, but the
Speaker 1: most popular were the skin condoms made from animal membranes.
Speaker 1: And these could actually be expensive and expenses a problem
Speaker 1: in contraceptives and in uh profile access against infection. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I mean as as well. We'll discuss later. To Like,
Speaker 1: one of the big appeals of the modern condom is
Speaker 1: that they are generally inexpensive and or free. Uh So yeah,
Speaker 1: if you if it's expensive, that is, that's that's not
Speaker 1: good for overall, um, public health and also just overall
Speaker 1: public usage of the technology. In terms of animal membranes,
Speaker 1: like we said, membranes and bladders, they were used for
Speaker 1: a number of different purposes, you know, the creation of
Speaker 1: wine skins or floats. The Aztecs would use inflated bladders
Speaker 1: inflated with air for religious purposes. They were like, you know,
Speaker 1: burned afterwards. And uh you see the sort of sort
Speaker 1: of thing pop up in other people's writing too, sometimes
Speaker 1: the outside of of actual um you know, utilitarian use
Speaker 1: of the bladders. Uh. Leonardo da Vinci wrote of inflating
Speaker 1: intestines as a means of better understanding their structure. Um,
Speaker 1: you know, after you know, after dissecting could havever uh.
Speaker 1: And he also wrote of the vessels and the penis
Speaker 1: that were filled with wind to make it erecked, which wind,
Speaker 1: which isn't exactly how it works, but I guess it's
Speaker 1: the same idea, uh, you know. And by the way,
Speaker 1: having access to rubber, some Mesoamerican cultures used actual rubber
Speaker 1: in the creation of enema bags for the administration of
Speaker 1: smoke or other substances. In other parts of the world,
Speaker 1: such as Africa, animal bladders had to be used to
Speaker 1: create such medicinal devices. Well, it's funny you mentioned rubber there,
Speaker 1: because the revolution in the condom world was definitely insured
Speaker 1: by the introduction of rubber as a material that you
Speaker 1: could use in manufacturing these things. So in eighteen thirty nine,
Speaker 1: when Charles Goodyear invented the process of vulcanization, I think
Speaker 1: I think that was a turning point and this could
Speaker 1: even be the subject of a future invention episode. Um.
Speaker 1: But in short, vulcanization is a process used for improving
Speaker 1: the material properties of rubber by chemically treating it. Specifically,
Speaker 1: you expose rubber to sulfur and other additives and things
Speaker 1: called accelerants at high temperatures, and the sulfur and the
Speaker 1: rubber and the additives they'll combine and they form these
Speaker 1: these chemical cross links, and the final product is much
Speaker 1: more durable and elastic than untreated rubber. And vulcanization opened
Speaker 1: the door to using rubbers of versatile industrial material and
Speaker 1: made it useful in a huge range of consumer products.
Speaker 1: It sort of changed the world of materials, and in
Speaker 1: eighteen fifty five condoms became one of those products that
Speaker 1: used rubber on the interior. Note that at the first
Speaker 1: World's Fair in Philadelphia in eighteen seventy six you could
Speaker 1: buy quote rubbers that people were calling them. They were
Speaker 1: quote handmade and as thick as inner tubes had a seam,
Speaker 1: and being costly, they were sold by the unit, so
Speaker 1: not really selling all the advantages on those early ones.
Speaker 1: But the the early model rubber condoms were not extremely
Speaker 1: popular since they were they were expensive, a lot of
Speaker 1: people didn't like how they felt. Some industrial modifications were
Speaker 1: made over the years and how they were molded. But
Speaker 1: another major upgrade was in the nineteen thirties when the
Speaker 1: process of using latex was introduced, and latex rubber is
Speaker 1: made from a dispersion of rubber particles in a water
Speaker 1: based solution, and latex manufacturing made condoms significantly cheaper and
Speaker 1: lead to people widely thinking of them as disposable, single
Speaker 1: use products rather than as like a reusable appliance. Both
Speaker 1: of these ultimately um selling points for the modern condom right,
Speaker 1: and of course today they are also non latex condoms
Speaker 1: you can buy. Some are still made from animal membranes
Speaker 1: actually like lamb secum. Some are also made from materials
Speaker 1: like polyurethane, and this can be useful for people who
Speaker 1: are allergic to latex. Some people are, though I believe
Speaker 1: the scientific consensus is that animal membrane condoms don't protect
Speaker 1: against S t I S t I s like latex
Speaker 1: condoms do, and that polyurethane condoms have a lower rate
Speaker 1: of effectiveness at contraception and are more owned breaking than latex.
Speaker 1: All Right, well, on that note, let's take one more break,
Speaker 1: and when we come back, we're going to discuss more
Speaker 1: about the current state of condoms, especially the benefits of condoms,
Speaker 1: some of the statistics backing up why you should be
Speaker 1: using condoms. All right, we're back. All right, Robert, tell
Speaker 1: me what have condoms ever done for the world. Oh, well,
Speaker 1: they've done a great deal for the world and continue
Speaker 1: to do a great deal for the world. UM. I
Speaker 1: was looking up some some good stats on this, and
Speaker 1: one of the great sources you can go to is
Speaker 1: the World Health Organization UM. They point out that condoms
Speaker 1: are safe and they're highly effective in preventing unwanted pregnancy
Speaker 1: and sexually transmitted infections, including HIV. Like, one of the
Speaker 1: take comes from looking at the information is really like
Speaker 1: there's no better time than now to make use of
Speaker 1: condoms in terms of just where the invention is, just
Speaker 1: how well engineered and refined everything is. It's come a
Speaker 1: long way. It's no longer the a ginner tube rubber
Speaker 1: with the seam right. Yeah. And if and like you said,
Speaker 1: if you have one is allergic to latex, uh, there
Speaker 1: are these other options as well. Uh. And also none
Speaker 1: of the made The World Health Organization points out that
Speaker 1: none of the major manufacturers of male and female latex
Speaker 1: condoms use mb T or ZMBT. This is a chemical
Speaker 1: material that has recently been identified as a potential carcinogen
Speaker 1: by the International Agency for Research on Cancer. Again, you
Speaker 1: are not going to find that in being used by
Speaker 1: major manufacturers of male and female latex condoms and uh on.
Speaker 1: On top of that, evidence just shows that male let
Speaker 1: aatex condoms have or greater protective effect against HIV and
Speaker 1: other sexually transmitted infections. That being said, we do have
Speaker 1: to stress that condoms are are not one effective. Um
Speaker 1: you know that. And then that can be said for
Speaker 1: for for most contraceptive methods, you know, aside from abstinence.
Speaker 1: Uh and by that I mean absolute abstinence, not a
Speaker 1: striving for abstinence, because I think there is an important
Speaker 1: distinction to be made there. Uh Still, if used correctly
Speaker 1: every time, they are proven means of preventing the spread
Speaker 1: of HIV in women and in men. According to Planned Parenthood,
Speaker 1: which if you if you haven't visited the Planned Parenthood website,
Speaker 1: I recommended planned parenthood dot org. They have a whole
Speaker 1: host of services, uh you know, aimed at at educating
Speaker 1: people about reproductive health and reproduction. Uh. And in fact,
Speaker 1: just the other day had a Planned Parenthood representative come
Speaker 1: out and give like an age tailored talk uh to
Speaker 1: my son and some of children from from his school group. Um,
Speaker 1: you know, on just like the parts of the body
Speaker 1: and what the official names for these parts of the
Speaker 1: bodies are and you know what's different from a boy
Speaker 1: and a girl, etcetera. You know, just like a very
Speaker 1: base age level, um uh, you know, talk on on
Speaker 1: on the the realities of our our different bodies. That's
Speaker 1: a great service because I think a lot of times,
Speaker 1: you know, if people don't know how to talk about
Speaker 1: reproduction and you know, reproductive organs and stuff with kids,
Speaker 1: just like the not having the right words and feeling
Speaker 1: awkwardness about it can lead to not talking about it
Speaker 1: at all, which can put like a kind of like
Speaker 1: shame or stigma around it that there shouldn't be right.
Speaker 1: And that can also be of course the same thing
Speaker 1: with the use of contraceptives and condoms. I know, for
Speaker 1: for my part um, like, the main bits of sexual
Speaker 1: education that I was exposed to in school were like
Speaker 1: high school level, like highly snickery class environments where like
Speaker 1: a football coach was begrudgingly demonstrating a condom being applied
Speaker 1: to a banana, that sort of thing, and I don't
Speaker 1: think anybody learned anything from it. You know, you had
Speaker 1: to sort of hope that that each individual in the
Speaker 1: class had somebody else, some other um you know, group
Speaker 1: or individual in their life taking an interest in explaining
Speaker 1: to them, you know what this was, how it worked,
Speaker 1: and how it fits into into healthy sexuality. Yeah, not
Speaker 1: teaching kids about reproductive health and reproductive reproduction does not
Speaker 1: mean they're not going to find out anything. It just
Speaker 1: means they're going to learn mostly like dubious facts from
Speaker 1: their friends. Right, or television which you depending on, or
Speaker 1: or the internet nowadays. Right. But again, planned parenthood um
Speaker 1: a really good source for information. Uh. It's a nonprofit
Speaker 1: organization that provides reproductive healthcare in the United States and globally. Uh.
Speaker 1: And according to them, condoms are ninety eight percent effective
Speaker 1: at preventing pregnancy if you use them perfectly and use
Speaker 1: them every time you have sex, but making a room
Speaker 1: for user air, the rate is actually more like percent effective.
Speaker 1: So statistically, they say, quote, fifteen out of a hundred
Speaker 1: people who use condoms as their only birth control method
Speaker 1: will get pregnant each year. Okay, So, as such, Planned
Speaker 1: Parenthood suggests using condoms and conjunction with other forms of
Speaker 1: birth control in the form of a pill and i
Speaker 1: U D, an implant ring or a shot. Basically, the
Speaker 1: combo just increases your odds of preventing pregnancy. And they
Speaker 1: also mentioned that employing a pullout method that means uh,
Speaker 1: pulling the penis out prior to ejaculation with the condom
Speaker 1: can also help, though on its own, the pullout method
Speaker 1: is not recommended. Also, we mentioned, you know, internal and
Speaker 1: external condoms, the male and the female condom, how they
Speaker 1: you know the usefulness of both. However, they should not
Speaker 1: be used at the same time. Likewise, one should not
Speaker 1: use more than one condom at once. Uh quote. Condoms
Speaker 1: are designed to be used on their own, and doubling
Speaker 1: up won't necessarily give you extra production. One condom used
Speaker 1: correctly is all the production you need. But again that's
Speaker 1: just the pregnancy angle. They also helped prevent the spread
Speaker 1: of STDs like HIV, clamydia, and gono rhea. They also
Speaker 1: point out the condoms are a great option for a
Speaker 1: number of other reasons. They're you know, they're inexpensive and
Speaker 1: sometimes free like we mentioned, and they do not require
Speaker 1: a prescription. You can you can buy them or obtain
Speaker 1: them again sometimes for free, from a number of different places.
Speaker 1: And they have no side effects, you know, aside from
Speaker 1: you know, some individuals may have a latex allergy or
Speaker 1: have sensitivity to latex. But again, there are other condoms
Speaker 1: on the market made of say plastic, and this can
Speaker 1: make is essentially makes this a non issue. And really
Speaker 1: the only downsides two condoms that the according to plant parenthood,
Speaker 1: or that they do require just a little getting used to.
Speaker 1: But again, I feel like that can be said for
Speaker 1: pretty much everything in human sexuality. So it's just one
Speaker 1: more thing to you know, learn the ropes on. But
Speaker 1: but that is but but also they stress that as
Speaker 1: part of a like modern human sexual culture, they're actually
Speaker 1: part of the excitement of sexual activity and and not
Speaker 1: a like hard stop to the action, you know, like
Speaker 1: the the Again, like we said at the beginning of
Speaker 1: the episode, like condoms are and should be considered sexy
Speaker 1: and not something that's like this purely clinical, like deeply
Speaker 1: serious thing that's want to you know, take you out
Speaker 1: at the moment, right. I mean, yeah, I guess that's
Speaker 1: a really interesting issue. It comes up throughout the history
Speaker 1: of the condom that we were reading, um, you know,
Speaker 1: different reports about how the different technologies at different times
Speaker 1: were said to feel and how people felt about using them.
Speaker 1: Where they you know, excited to use them, where they
Speaker 1: disinclined they kind of not really like having to use them. Uh,
Speaker 1: these are the kind of things that I feel like
Speaker 1: from from one type of like medical or clinical approach,
Speaker 1: you would look at stuff like that and say like, well,
Speaker 1: that's just extraneous details. You know. What we want to
Speaker 1: know is like how effective is it when it's used?
Speaker 1: But whether or not people feel like using something is
Speaker 1: an important thing in public health. That's going to tell
Speaker 1: you probably how often it actually gets used in in
Speaker 1: people's real lives. Yeah, and you know, this is an
Speaker 1: area probably where you know, things like portrayal of condoms
Speaker 1: and media are ultimately important because if the if the
Speaker 1: scene in which a condom is produced, it is still erotic,
Speaker 1: cortitilating um. You know, that is going to be part
Speaker 1: of the overall messaging that this this is, this is
Speaker 1: not you know, a deterrent to your sexual activity. This
Speaker 1: is a part of the sexual activity. You don't want
Speaker 1: people thinking about it as like something you've got to
Speaker 1: do but it's a bummer. Yeah. And it's interesting to
Speaker 1: think about all this too, in in comparison to other inventions,
Speaker 1: because there are probably let their levels of this within
Speaker 1: the invention, like the invention not only we've seen this
Speaker 1: in some of the examples we've discussed on the show,
Speaker 1: where it doesn't only have to work, Uh, it has
Speaker 1: to be something that people are you know, have ease
Speaker 1: and using and want to use. You know, see that
Speaker 1: in the history of let's say, you know, the motion
Speaker 1: picture cameras that we've recently discussed. Yeah, that's right. I
Speaker 1: mean it's not enough for a technology or technological capability
Speaker 1: to merely exist. It has to be adopted. I mean,
Speaker 1: you know, you can you can lead a horse to water, right,
Speaker 1: but you can't make it wear a giant rubber condom.
Speaker 1: I haven't looked this up, but I wonder what some
Speaker 1: of the like mark keting materials on those things said.
Speaker 1: You know, is it like vulcanized for extra strength? Yeah,
Speaker 1: or just you know, I can imagine them. Uh, you know,
Speaker 1: like selling this the science of the of the material
Speaker 1: you know, I mean because ultimately that the history of
Speaker 1: condoms as the history of material science, because that, again,
Speaker 1: the basic concept was was clearly evident to us, you know,
Speaker 1: thousands of years ago. Uh, it's just been figuring out
Speaker 1: exactly how they work and then figuring out the best
Speaker 1: uh you know, use of materials to make it possible. Yeah,
Speaker 1: But now now that we've had this conversation, it really
Speaker 1: doesn't make sense to me that most of the marketing
Speaker 1: you see around condoms is not based on like how
Speaker 1: effective they are and how you know, it's not like
Speaker 1: citing statistics about how good they are at stopping the
Speaker 1: spread of diseases and and preventing pregnancy. It's more about
Speaker 1: trying to make them sexy, like the brands tend to
Speaker 1: advertise with sexually charged imagery and stuff like that. And
Speaker 1: I mean, on one hand, you could just say, well,
Speaker 1: they're just trying to elder product, which they are, But
Speaker 1: on the other hand, you could say, well, in a
Speaker 1: in a way that's actually a public good. Yeah. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I guess ultimately you have to have both um streams
Speaker 1: of communication going on, Like an individual needs to to
Speaker 1: know like the the the hard medical side of the equation,
Speaker 1: but also be exposed to like the you know, the
Speaker 1: cultural sexy messaging of it. And uh, I mean it
Speaker 1: would be interesting so to look at, you know, how
Speaker 1: you know, what sort of tug and poll goes on
Speaker 1: with these two streams of communication in the media today.
Speaker 1: But I'm I'm guessing that we have perhaps a healthy
Speaker 1: balance of the two, I should hope. So anyway, that
Speaker 1: being said, clearly, like we we still have to have
Speaker 1: to push communication on the use of condoms, and they're
Speaker 1: put plenty of initiatives around the world in the US
Speaker 1: as well, Uh, you know, to remind everyone, to educate people,
Speaker 1: to keep the you know, the fire burning on this
Speaker 1: topic and make people aware that you know, this is
Speaker 1: what they all, this is why you should use them,
Speaker 1: and uh and and this is why they are effective.
Speaker 1: But also some of these caveats like uh, like you know,
Speaker 1: it's better if you use them in conjunction with these
Speaker 1: other birth control methods as well. Right now with a
Speaker 1: lot of as with a lot of inventions that we've
Speaker 1: talked about on the show, Um, the innovation is not over.
Speaker 1: Oh there are tons of modern variants and it attempts
Speaker 1: to continue, Yeah, changing it innovating, didn't the was it
Speaker 1: the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation that was investing in
Speaker 1: prizes for essentially I think that they were trying to
Speaker 1: create effective condoms that that we're just like better from
Speaker 1: a sensation point of view. Yeah, that was That was
Speaker 1: one of the facts brought up to us by Scott Benjamin,
Speaker 1: who helped us on the research for this show. He
Speaker 1: pointed out that this was in March of Bill and
Speaker 1: Millindi Gates Foundation issued a challenge the public develop econdom
Speaker 1: that was safe and effective while still preserving pleasure for
Speaker 1: the user. Uh. Twenty two grants were awarded to organizations
Speaker 1: claiming to have the next generation of condoms. Um. You know,
Speaker 1: so of talking about using things like graphene and nano
Speaker 1: fabric and hydro gel, etcetera. Which is which does bring
Speaker 1: to mind the idea of someone creating like the stealth
Speaker 1: bomber of condoms that is perhaps maybe not at all
Speaker 1: you know, practical at this point, but you know, hey,
Speaker 1: could lead to just improved material usage in the future. Yeah. Well,
Speaker 1: but also making them more and more appealing to the
Speaker 1: user makes makes it likely that they will be used
Speaker 1: more often in a greater percentage of cases. Yeah, exactly.
Speaker 1: And yes, Scott actually included a list of like various
Speaker 1: um uh possible future condoms that are in development, things
Speaker 1: like spray on condoms or the galactic cap, which Scott
Speaker 1: just tells us looks complicated. Um, things like the consent condom,
Speaker 1: which requires four hands to open um. Yeah, so there
Speaker 1: are a lot of different initiatives out there, both technological
Speaker 1: and again uh, you know, messaging initiatives to uh to
Speaker 1: to let everyone know you know about the benefits of
Speaker 1: condom use. All right, So there you have it. Um,
Speaker 1: I'm trying to remember if we've done any any other
Speaker 1: like health related invention episodes. So we did the X
Speaker 1: ray X ray and we did that's the main one
Speaker 1: I'm remembering. Okay, well, I guess the call out to
Speaker 1: listeners a toothpaste toothpaste. Yes, So yeah, we would like
Speaker 1: to continue to you know, just sort of hit these
Speaker 1: different classifications of invention. So if there's another health related
Speaker 1: invention you would like to hear us cover on the show,
Speaker 1: or if there's some angle in this episode that you
Speaker 1: feel like we could explore in another episode, let us know, like,
Speaker 1: for instance, rubber as we discuss um, let us know,
Speaker 1: we'd love to explore those topics. And in the meantime,
Speaker 1: if you want to check out other episodes of Invention,
Speaker 1: head on over to invention pod dot com. That's where
Speaker 1: you'll find them. And if you want to support the show,
Speaker 1: here's what you can do. First of all, tell some
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Speaker 1: to our audio producer Tori Harrison and our guest producer today,
Speaker 1: Maya Cole UH. If you would like to get in
Speaker 1: touch with us directly to let us know feedback on
Speaker 1: this on today's episode, to suggest topic for the future,
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