Menotoxin

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The supposed phytotoxic effect of menotoxin on a Cinerea flower.

Menotoxin (from ancient Greek μήν mēn , German 'month' , and -toxin , together monthly poison ), also menstrual poison , is the name of a hypothetical poison that was suspected in the sweat and blood of women during menstruation at the beginning of the 20th century . The existence of menotoxin was discussed until 1979. According to the current state of science there is no evidence for the existence of menotoxin. The apparently positive results published in 1920 by Béla Schick and other scientists were based on inadequate control groups , poor statistics, and confirmation errors .

Historical perspective

The cultural history of menstruation is complex, and the existence of a toxin associated with menstruation has been speculated since biblical times. Menstruating women are dangerous for vines , can be the reason for withered blossoms on fruit trees and responsible for the shrinking of mushroom beds . Canning factories and flower shops kept menstrual schedule lists to counter this "danger". Useful suggestions were also made: until the 16th century, it was customary to show a menstruating woman around the garden when the caterpillars of the cabbage white butterfly threatened to be a nuisance. It seemed natural to speculate about a toxin. The term menotoxin goes back to at least 1900 by Alexander Ferenczi. He speculated about a substance that accumulates in the woman's body and after 28 days accumulates in such a way that it leads to self-poisoning.

Béla Schicks menotoxin

For Béla Schick, withered roses were the first indication of the existence of menotoxin.

Béla Schick reported in a medical article in 1920 that freshly cut flowers wilted after just a few hours and that yeast dough would rise poorly if they were held or kneaded by a woman between the first and third day of her cycle. This study was the first to substantiate the menotoxin hypothesis and to make it experimentally accessible. Schick suspected a toxin he called menotoxin, and took his observations as confirmation of popular wisdom and customs that menstruating women should not handle plants, fermenting wine, or mushrooms. He concludes his studies with the words:

“But I say we should be glad that this belief [that menstruating women are unclean] has not been eradicated. We should be grateful to the people that they tenaciously hold on to such facts that have survived through oral tradition. Science often comes to recognize such facts late. "

- Béla Schick : in B. Schick: The menstrual poison. May 6, 1920

A poison for plants and animals

The relative difference in phytotoxicity of N = 22 women measured during the first three days of the menstrual cycle and two weeks after. All values ​​fall by 0.

Critical voices about Béla Schick's work, which criticized uncontrolled sources of error, erroneous statistics and the anecdotal nature of his study, came up early. More conscientiously conducted studies could not confirm the menotoxin hypothesis (see figure), however, the existence of menotoxin came as no surprise to many doctors and it was considered an attractive hypothesis to explain various women's diseases.

Subsequently, menotoxin was found in almost all excretions from menstruating women. For example, menotoxin was thought to be neurotoxic , allergenic and asthma-causing , and it was suspected to be a possible cause of gastrointestinal complaints in infants . Some hypotheses have also been published on the chemical nature of menotoxin. Karel Klaus and Anna Lánczos speculated about the excretion of trimethylamine in sweat as the reason for the toxic effect, others about a molecule related to oxycholesterol (5,6-epoxycholesterol).

The danger of menotoxin has also been investigated in non-human organisms. Building on early studies, especially those by Béla Schick, menotoxin was believed to be phytotoxic and the measurement of phytotoxicity was an established method of detection for menotoxin. Béla Schick reported in his work from 1920 that he first observed the effect in a bouquet of red roses and that he was able to reproduce the effect with anemones and chrysanthemums . Vernon Pickles studied primroses , David Macht and Dorothy Lubin, among others, peas and William Freeman in a study that could not find any effects of menotoxin, lupins .

When examining frog nerves, Anna Lánczos described that nerves prepared from her during the menstrual period or premenstrually prepared reacted more strongly to narcotics , and she deduced from this that these nerves might have been damaged by menotoxin through accidental contact. Rats that had been exposed to menotoxin had difficulty orienting themselves or had died after being given menstrual blood. These experiments were also characterized by inadequate controls. The rodents, for example, died as a result of massive bacterial infections and could be protected from the harmful effects of menotoxin by administering antibiotics .

More modern reception

In 1974 an exchange of articles on menotoxin sparked an ongoing debate in The Lancet , one of the most important and widely read journals in modern medicine, culminating in an article in which Virginia L. Ernster wrote that she had the apparent with disbelief and skepticism Support for such widespread superstitions heard, and neither a photograph of a yellowed flower from 1924 nor the unexplained death of a tree could be sufficient evidence to convince about menotoxin.

A few years later, The Lancet also presented papers on substances that could affect plants as well as women's moods. The menotoxin hypothesis was an inspiration for studies of this type.

The existence of menotoxin is assessed very critically by modern science; there is no evidence for the existence of menotoxin. However, due to the curious, bizarre and sometimes anecdotal arguments, the history of menotoxin is sporadically reflected in popular scientific and scientific literature.

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b c d David I. Macht, Dorothy Lubin: A phyto-pharmacological study of menstrual toxin . In: Journal of Pharmacology and Experimental Therapeutics . tape 22 , no. 5 , December 1, 1923, p. 413-466 ( abstract ).
  2. ↑ a b c d e Béla Schick : The menstrual poison . In: Wiener Klinische Wochenschrift . tape 33 , no. 395 , May 6, 1920 ( abstract ).
  3. ↑ Frank Krogmann: Menotoxin (menstrual poison). In: Werner E. Gerabek , Bernhard D. Haage, Gundolf Keil , Wolfgang Wegner (eds.): Enzyklopädie Medizingeschichte. De Gruyter, Berlin / New York 2005, ISBN 3-11-015714-4 , p. 970.
  4. ↑ a b c Vernon R. Pickles: Prostaglandins and dysmenorrhea . Historical survey. In: Acta Obstet. Gynecol. Scand. tape 87 , January 1979, p. 7-12 , doi : 10.3109 / 00016347909157782 .
  5. ^ A. Ferenczi: A new attempt at explaining menstruation . In: Orvosi hetilap . tape 32 , 1900 ( excerpt ).
  6. ^ A b c William Freeman, Joseph M. Looney, Rose R. Small: Studies on the phytotoxic index II. Menstrual toxin ("menotoxin") . In: Journal of Pharmacology and Experimental Therapeutics . tape 52 , no. 2 , October 1, 1934, p. 179-183 ( abstract ).
  7. ↑ a b c Anna Lánczos: On the question of menotoxin . In: Naunyn-Schmiedeberg's archive for experimental pathology and pharmacology . tape 156 , no. 1 , December 1930, p. 117-124 , doi : 10.1007 / BF01859316 .
  8. ^ M. Perlstein, A. Matheson: Allergy Due to Menotoxin of Pregnancy . In: Archives of Pediatrics and Adolescent Medicine . tape 52 , no. 2 , August 1936, p. 303-307 , doi : 10.1001 / archpedi.1936.04140020046005 .
  9. ^ K. Klaus: Contribution to the biochemistry of menstruation . In: Biochemical Journal . tape 185 , no. 3-10 , 1927 (cited in MF Ashley-Montagu: Trimethylamine in Menstruous Women. In: Nature. Volume 142, December 24, 1938, pp. 1121-1122, doi: 10.1038 / 1421121b0 ).
  10. ↑ a b c D. I. Macht, ME Davis: Experimental studies, old and new, on menstrual toxin . In: Journal of Comparative Psychology . tape 18 , August 1934, p. 113-134 , doi : 10.1037 / h0074380 , PMID 12262232 .
  11. ^ DI Macht, O. Hyndman: Effect of menotoxin injections on behavior of rats in the maze . In: Experimental Biology and Medicine . tape 23 , no. 3 , December 1, 1925, p. 208-209 , doi : 10.3181 / 00379727-23-2893 .
  12. ^ A b Geoffrey Davis: "Menstrual Toxin" and Human Fertility . In: Lancet . tape 303 , no. 7867 , June 8, 1974, p. 1172-1173 , doi : 10.1016 / S0140-6736 (74) 90664-3 .
  13. ↑ Vernon R. Pickles: Prostaglandins and Dysmenorrhea Historical Survey. In: Acta Obstetricia et Gynecologica Scandinavica. 58, 1979, p. 7, doi : 10.3109 / 00016347909157782 .
  14. ↑ Virginia L. Serious: Menstrual Toxin . In: Lancet . tape 303 , no. 7870 , June 29, 1974, p. 1347 , doi : 10.1016 / S0140-6736 (74) 90718-1 .
  15. ^ JA Bryant, DG Heathcote, VR Pickles: The search for "menotoxin" . In: Lancet . tape 1 , no. 8014 , April 2, 1977, p. 753 , doi : 10.1016 / S0140-6736 (77) 92199-7 , PMID 66546 .
  16. ↑ Kate Clancy: Menstruation is just blood and tissue you ended up not using. In: Scientific American. September 9, 2011, accessed July 12, 2017 .
  17. ↑ Helen King: Menotoxin - When Menstruation Can Kill? In: Wonders and Marvels. September 2013, accessed on July 12, 2017 .
  18. ^ F. von Krogmann: Béla Schick (1877-1967) and his discovery: "The menotoxin" . In: Würzburg medical history reports . tape 17 , 1998, pp. 21-30 , PMID 11638826 .