Wildlife Contraceptive Vaccine Questioned

An Australian scientist is questioning the efficacy of a contraceptive vaccine used to control populations of wildlife, such as rabbits and foxes.

University of New South Wales genetics Professor Des Cooper warns the immuno-contraception method isn’t fully effective and manipulates natural reproduction in ways that can’t be predicted or controlled.

An immuno-contraceptive vaccine causes an animal’s immune system to produce antibodies that act against some essential event or structure in the reproductive process. The antibodies can act against sperm, eggs or reproductive hormones, which prevent either fertilization or the production of sperm and eggs.

The technique’s supporters say it is more humane than other methods of population control, including shooting, trapping or poisoning.

Cooper, an expert in mammal reproduction in the university’s School of Biological, Earth and Environmental Sciences, questions immuno-contraception on three grounds: immuno-contraceptives are ineffective against substantial minorities of animals; the technique is effectively a form of genetic engineering, and animals are suffering side-effects from multiple injections and adjuvant substances designed to boost the effectiveness of immuno-contraceptives.

He details his objections in the current issue of the journal Reproduction.