Sex could soon be a purely recreational activity as more couples turn to IVF to have children, the inventor of the contraceptive pill has claimed.
Professor Carl Djerassi predicts that sex and reproduction will no longer be linked by 2050, as advancements in fertility treatments mean men and women will choose to have their eggs and sperm frozen at a young age, before being sterilised.
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"Over the next few decades, say by the year 2050, more IVF fertilisations will occur among fertile women than the current five million fertility-impaired ones," he told the Sunday Telegraph. "For them separation between sex and reproduction will be 100 per cent."
He said the practice would mean the end of abortions, as no children will be unplanned or unwanted. It could also have the added benefit that the children produced would be healthier, as the eggs and sperm used would be younger.
Djerassi is an emeritus professor of chemistry at Stanford University and played an integral role in the development of the contraceptive pill in 1951 by synthesising the hormone progesterone.
He said he doubted whether a male contraceptive pill would ever be available, claiming it would take too long to test its impact on the quality of sperm.