WOMEN may suffer a permanent decline in sex drive after taking the contraceptive pill, researchers said yesterday.

Loss of libido is a known side effect of the Pill, caused by a lowering of testosterone levels.

Until now it had been assumed that this was reversible, and ceased to be a problem as soon as a woman ceased taking the Pill. However, a recent study suggests that the effect on libido might be longer lasting or even permanent. A research team at the University of Boston, Massachusetts, studied 125 young women attending a sexual dysfunction clinic. Sixty two were taking oral contraceptives, forty had previously taken them and twenty-three had never been on the Pill. The team measured levels of a substance called sex hormone binding globulin — which inhibits testosterone and blocks its effects — every three months for a year and found that it was seven times higher in users of the Pill.

Levels declined in women who had stopped, but remained three to four times higher than those with no history of using oral contraceptives. Dr Goldstein, an author of the report, said: “There’s the possibility (the Pill) is imprinting a woman for the rest of her life.”

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