- A leading gynaecologist has recently claimed that
female politicians are using testosterone implants to try to match
their male counterparts in assertiveness and competitiveness.
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- Malcolm Whitehead, a Harley Street doctor, said he
had prescribed the hormone for a number of women who wanted to "beef
up" their image in the macho world of politics. He commented: "I have
prescribed testosterone implants for female politicians in Westminster
who want to compete better with their male colleagues in committee
meetings and parliamentary debates. They claim the hormone boosts
their assertiveness and makes them feel more powerful."
-
- His extraordinary claim - recently published in the
New Statesman magazine - was greeted with disbelief in Westminster -
but, then again, which female MP was going to publicly admit to trying
testosterone?
-
- Patricia Hewitt, the Trade and Industry Secretary,
said: "MPs are far more likely to succeed if they use rational
arguments rather than hormonal-fuelled rhetoric." Margaret Beckett,
the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs Secretary, also denied using
the implants, saying: "Women don't have to be like men to be
successful." And Conservative Julie Kirkbride added: "I can't believe
Margaret Thatcher would have resorted to this type of thing, and she
got to the top in a man's world."
-
- But Mr Whitehead, who runs a trust offering advice
to menopausal women, maintained he is increasingly being approached by
women MPs wanting testosterone implants. The hormone - which is said
to fuel a man's sex drive - is produced in small amounts by women - up
to ten times lower levels.
-
- However, as women age those levels can dip, just as
the female hormones more usually associated with the menopause do.
Testosterone and related hormones in women are produced from the same
organs where more traditional female hormones originate - the ovaries
and the adrenal glands, which sit just above the kidneys. The lower
testosterone levels of the menopause are associated with causing women
to lose interest in sex, have lower energy levels and, in some cases,
reduces their confidence and mood.
-
- Testosterone implants are meant to solve that
problem. The treatment involves embedding a small pellet under the
skin, which releases a fixed testosterone dose into the bloodstream
over a six-month period.
-
- Critics claim this has dangers, but Mr Whitehead
dismissed that suggestion, saying: "As long as they stay within the
normal hormonal range, there is nothing to worry about. All the talk
of deepening voices and beard growth is complete nonsense."
-
- Testosterone can't as yet be taken orally, but can
be taken as a skin patch, a chemical that dissolves under the tongue,
or as an injection.
-
- The most sophisticated medical view now of hormone
replacement therapy for women in the menopause is that it should
probably include a touch of testosterone as well to assist with mood
and sex drive.
-
- But a key controversy is that, unlike the situation
in men, we still lack enough data about how normal testosterone levels
vary in women throughout their life span or even through the monthly
menstrual cycle. So it's difficult to know from a blood test what
would constitute abnormally low levels and what would therefore need
topping up from treatment.
-
- Given the definite advantages to women in terms of
mood and drive on taking testosterone, this leads some doctors to
suggest it should be tried without any hard evidence that the woman is
suffering from an actual testosterone deficiency.
-
- But Labour's Bridget Prentice - who was recently
promoted to the whip's office - said she had not heard of colleagues
using the implants. "Women are more than able to compete without
taking steps like this," she added.
-
- However the medical scientists investigating the
role of testosterone in women don't share this apparent scepticism
among high-powered women. They believe that testosterone plays an
important role in maintaining mental and physical functions of healthy
women.
-
- A recent study in the Netherlands found that taking
testosterone dissolved under the tongue markedly improved normal
women's sex drive and arousal.
-
- Another study by Dr Valerie Grant at the University
of Auckland, New Zealand, found that how dominant you were as a woman
was strongly linked to how high your testosterone levels were. A
previous similar study had found higher testosterone levels in
professional and managerial women compared to housewives and clerical
workers.
-
- Dr Helen Bateup, a neuroendocrinologist, and
colleagues at the Rockefeller University in New York recently examined
how competing in rugby games effected the testosterone levels in
women. In an intriguing and unique experiment they performed blood
tests on a nationally recognised college women's rugby team in order
to investigate how women's hormones change in anticipation of and
response to aggressive striving.
-
- Men characteristically experience a testosterone
increase in anticipation of competition. This pre-competition rise is
likely to make the individual more willing to take risks, improve
psychomotor function like hand-eye co-ordination and increase
cognitive performance as these are all the positive effects of
testosterone on the body and brain. For a few hours following
competition, testosterone is high in sports winners relative to losers
and this rise in testosterone following a win is associated with
positive mood.
-
- Studies show that these changes also occur in
non-physical competition such as chess matches. This suggests
testosterone is so useful in bringing about changes that help improve
competitiveness that physical competition is not all that is needed to
produce a testosterone surge.
-
- This has the intriguing implication that we could
all benefit from testosterone even if we are not contemplating a
physical competitive challenge like a sport, but perhaps an
intellectual contest, just as MPs do in the aggressive atmosphere of
parliament.
-
- Indeed, active participation in the competition is
not necessarily required either to influence testosterone.
Testosterone levels increase among spectators watching their favourite
sports teams win and decrease for the fans of the losing teams. These
findings suggest that just being in parliament, taking part in the
charged atmosphere and watching the competition, is enough to raise
your testosterone levels.
-
- But if just watching a game you are involved in as
an active fan can significantly raise your testosterone levels then
maybe you don't need to go to a Harley Street doctor to obtain
supplementation - perhaps it is possible to boost your levels more
naturally.
-
- Strategies that would do this include taking part in
competitive sport. Indeed, just regular physical exercise will boost
testosterone and women who exercise regularly have significantly
higher testosterone levels than those who don't.
-
- But maybe the historical huge contrast in
testosterone levels between men and women had an evolutionary basis
which it might be dangerous to mess with. Women's response to
challenges may be more defensive in nature than men's - the female
approach has been termed a "tend and befriend" strategy to
differentiate it from the "fight or flight" response attributed to men
and which their higher testosterone levels probably helps
produce.
-
- However, it's important not to forget the nickname
given to testosterone by endocrinologists is the "one night stand"
hormone as it increases sex drive and risk taking. So it's thought to
underpin the much greater male propensity to seek unattached sex
compared to women.
-
- If female politicians really are taking testosterone
or are having their levels boosted by being in the competitive
atmosphere of parliament, could these hormonal changes have wider
political implications? Are we more likely in the future to see female
MPs getting caught up in the kind of sex scandals that have so
characterised male politicians?
-
- If this is the case it might mean that testosterone
causes women politicians to lose at least one clear advantage female
MPs historically had over the men ... at least their families could
trust them more.
-
- - Dr Raj Persaud is consultant psychiatrist at the
Maudsley Hospital in South London and the author of From the Edge of
the Couch, published by Bantam Press, £12.99
-
- ©2003 scotsman.com
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- http://www.thescotsman.co.uk/health.cfm?id=813172003
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