Semen is an anti-depressant. Who knew?

Prof Lazar Greenfield is a highly respected professor of surgery from the University of Michigan and the president of the American College of Surgeons. Or he was until recently when found himself embroiled in a scandal dubbed ‘semengate’ and had to resign.

In the industry publication he edits, Surgery News, he wrote a Valentine’s-Day themed editorial about the mood-boosting effects of semen on women. He cited a study published in 2002 by Gordon Gallup, a psychologist at SUNY-Albany which found that symptoms of depression and suicide attempts were higher among women who used condoms regularly compared to those who didn’t.

Alert, alert….can you feel the controversy exploding?

The Guardian reports…

….. Moreover, the women who didn’t use condoms became more depressed the longer they went without having sex. Gallup suggested this was because semen contains oestrogen and prostaglandins which have been linked to lower levels of depression, and oxytocin which promotes social bonding.Gallup’s study came with an important caveat: “I want to make it clear that we are not advocating that people abstain from using condoms. Clearly an unwanted pregnancy or a sexually transmitted disease would more than offset any advantageous psychological effects of semen.”

Go here to read the full article

So semen makes you happy? And what about gay men? They must be pretty happy. Is that why they’re called, you know, gay?

The last word (before he was forced to resign) goes to Prof Greenfield who wrote: “So there’s a deeper bond between men and women than St Valentine would have suspected, and now we know there’s a better gift for that day than chocolate.”

Over to you. Insert lame jokes here…..

[Thanks Andrew]