Birth Control by Rule?

Last fortnight the Federal Trade Commission ordered Scientific Instruments, Inc. of Chicago to "cease and desist from representing . . . that its birth control device, The Rule of Life, or O. K. Calendar or any other device operating upon the same theory, provides a method of complete, or any definitely stated percentage, of birth control."

Original rhythm boys were Gynecologists Kyusaku Ogino of Japan and Hermann Knaus of Prague. They found that every woman has a sterile period of about two weeks in her menstrual cycle, concluded that such periods could be calculated as accurately as astronomers chart eclipses of the moon. To simplify elaborate mathematical computations, some ten companies throughout the U. S. put out a line of graphs, wheels, calendars and slide rules, which sell from 10-c- to $5.

Chief medical advocate of the "safe period" in the U. S. is Dr. Leo John Latz of Chicago, author of a sugary little tract called The Rhythm. Endorsed by the Catholic Church, the book, usually sold with "Concip Calendar," went through six editions, sold over 200,000 copies in eight years.

Gynecologists doubt that it is now possible to figure out accurately a woman's sterile period. What jumbles all the figures is the fact that the menstrual cycle is as irregular and almost as unpredictable as the weather, easily upset by such things as colds, arguments, rainy spells, overwork.

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