Behold, the future: the year is 2015, times are tough, and one enterprising design student has come up with a new way to make life worth living again. No, it’s not a cure for cancer or a vaccine for the common cold—it’s something much, much better. It’s a spray-on condom.
While using normal condoms (the kind you buy in a drug store) is still one of the best ways to reduce the risk of pregnancy and STIs, Michele Chu, a student at the Pratt Institute, thinks we can do a little better. Part of a “lover’s kit” that also features a remote control and the kind of condoms that are already available (the control’s not for that—it’s for automatically unclasping bras), the prototype for the spray-on condom comes in an aerosol can and would require the user to spray the contents all around their genitals before engaging in sexual intercourse. The good news? The condom’s supposed to be individualized and unique to the anatomy of the wearer. The bad news? I can’t imagine many people would want to carry around a spray can full of prophylactics in their purse or backpack.
Chu, of course, isn’t the first one to come up with the idea for a better, more individualized form of sexual protection. It’s just that Chu’s idea is the first to focus on the aesthetics of condom design as opposed to the safety aspect. And, it’s the first time that condoms would come with a remote control to enhance flavors and temperatures. (No one’s really sure how that works.)
A few years ago, German entrepreneur Jan Vinzenz Krause came close to putting a spray-on condom on the market. While Chu seems bored with the design of the condom, Krause felt it was more an issue of public health. By using the penis as a mold for the condom, a spray-on would better fit men with smaller or unusually-shaped penises.
Krause’s prototype involved a plastic tube that sprayed liquid latex onto the erect penis from all sides, like a car in a car wash. He said that while some men were apprehensive about putting their penis in the tube, the bigger issue was that the latex took two to three minutes to fully dry.
That certainly sounds like…something. Fortunately, Chu’s prototype doesn’t include any tubes or lengthy waiting times, but there are still a lot of questions about the practicality of Chu’s idea. For instance, how realistic is it for a condom coming from a spray bottle (like a liquid bandage) to be useful against the spread of sexually transmitted infections? Also: how do you know when you’re done putting the condom on? I don’t know about you, but I can envision a lot of dudes accidentally getting too overzealous and not putting the bottle down until their private parts looked like a turkey leg haphazardly wrapped in 15 layers of protective plastic wrap.
Still, it’s a good idea. And, considering that we wouldn’t even be having a conversation like this so openly even thirty years ago, just the discussion is a sign of progress. The spray-on condom? I bet lots of people will be waiting a few generations until the method’s perfected.
(Via The Huffington Post)