Dr. Pépin is investigating the potential use of AMH in people, not as a gene therapy but as a pill or injection that must be taken continuously. Most contraceptives today prevent ovulation, but AMH would act earlier, blocking follicles from maturing.
He thinks that it might be useful for women who could not take birth control pills with progesterone or estrogen for medical reasons or that it could help women undergoing cancer treatments preserve their fertility. “It’s a hormone that we didn’t get to play with before that potentially has many different applications in women’s health,” he said.
As a gene therapy that could be permanent, the use of AMH in people is unlikely. “But it’s actually the perfect tool to control cat overpopulation,” he said. Four of the cats in the study did not show behaviors indicating they were ready to mate, and two allowed male cats to mate with them, but did not ovulate.
Dr. Pépin and Dr. Swanson, an expert in feline reproduction (and a scientific advisory board member of the Michelson Found Animals Foundation, which funded the work), are planning a larger study that could support an application to the Food and Drug Administration to consider approving the therapy to be marketed for use in cats.
They are also testing the therapy in kittens, which can be treated starting at eight weeks of age, as well as in dogs, which also have enormous stray populations, particularly in other countries.
“This is really exciting, and I hope it will pan out,” said Julie Levy, a veterinarian at the University of Florida College of Veterinary Medicine in Gainesville, who was not involved with the study. “Wouldn’t it be great if we could send out a technician into the field to inject cats and then let them go?”
The study is an example of the Michelson foundation’s practice of “throwing a lot of big money at the problem” to find nonsurgical contraception for stray cats and dogs, said Dr. Levy, who works with cats in outdoor colonies and shelters, both in the United States and abroad.
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