Return of the sponge

To its loyal users, it was the perfect contraceptive. Then 10 years ago, it disappeared from shops, and panic buying ensued. Now it's coming back. Not a moment too soon, says Sophie Radice

I was in my early twenties when I first came across the Today contraceptive sponge in my local chemist, and I used it happily for the next five years.

I was in my early twenties when I first came across the Today contraceptive sponge in my local chemist, and I used it happily for the next five years.

I had been on the Pill since I was 16 and had come off it because I didn't like the way it made me feel. I had tried the diaphragm, but my first husband said the rim "bit him" (he had the red marks to prove it). We didn't enjoy condoms, and I'd heard too many horror stories about IUDs. I was thrilled to find a new form of birth control.

The Today Sponge is a round, disposable polyurethane foam device, soaked in spermicide, that is inserted into the vagina to block the cervix. The beauty of it was that it could be bought in packs of three at your chemist, put in ahead of time if you wanted to and be used for 24 hours. You could have any amount of sex in that period without having to add spermicide. And it was so soft and unobtrusive that it couldn't be felt by either of you.

It was liberating not to have to go to a clinic and be told to "pop your knickers off", but instead to buy your contraceptives spontaneously. While diaphragms and IUDs had to be fitted by a doctor, one size fitted all with the Today Sponge.

It suited me because I was in a long-term relationship and trusted him (the sponge offers no protection against sexually transmitted diseases), and it would not have been a disaster if I had got pregnant. The Today sponge is 91 per cent effective, about the same as the condom but not as effective as the Pill.

The only time its use was less conducive to happiness was when you thought you were going to have sex, but had misjudged things. You couldn't help feeling that a perfectly good sponge, which in the late Eighties cost a couple of quid, had gone to waste.

In the early Nineties, with me in my second marriage, the Today Sponge disappeared. When I asked my chemist what had happened to them, he shrugged; he didn't know the details, but they'd been taken off the market. I assumed that Today was just not that popular. I carried on looking, but gave up after fruitless visits to chemists in various parts of the country.

Actually, when production stopped just over a decade ago, many women in America, where 250 million of the sponges were sold from 1983 to 1995, decided to stock up and hoard them. The Today Sponge was the top-selling over-the-counter female contraceptive in the US, with $25m in retail sales. But American Home Products (now Wyeth) stopped production after the US Food and Drugs Administration found bacteria in the water and air systems of the factory. The FDA said that the sponge's safety and effectiveness were never questioned. The producers simply stopped making it rather than pay to upgrade its plant.

The plight of bereft sponge fans was depicted in the sitcom Seinfeld in 1995. Elaine Benes, played by Julia Louis-Dreyfus, desperately scoured stores for her favourite birth control and stockpiled sponges. To conserve her supply, she started determining whether men were "spongeworthy" - not just worth going to bed with, but worth using a sponge on. The phrase "spongeworthy" became a synonym for "good in bed".

Now, it seems, the sponge will be back on the shelves. Many American women have been buying them from Canada, where they returned to sale via the internet in 2003, after the patents and complex manufacturing equipment were bought by Allendale Pharmaceuticals in 1998.

Gene Detroyer, Allendale's president, hoped to get the sponges back on the US and world markets at the same time, but tough FDA standards for manufacturing and record-keeping led to delays. The sponges will be sold on the internet in the US for the next couple of months.

The first sponges will go mostly to 700 people who ordered them - 24 each on average - as far back as January 2001, and to 1,000 subscribers to The Spongeworthy Watch, an e-mail newsletter sent out by birthcontrol.com. But in a few months' time, they'll be back on the shelves in the US.

Detroyer says he hopes they'll be on sale in the UK again by the end of this year. "I have been visiting pharmacies in the UK, and there was a very high level of product recognition, even though it's been off the shelves for 10 years. On our website, there are more than 100 postings from British women wanting to know when they will be able to get it. There have been more than 9,000 calls and e-mails in the last couple of years, so it seems there's still a great need for another contraceptive choice."

Lynn Hearton, a nurse at the Family Planning Association, says: "Women need to know that the contraceptive sponge will be out there as another choice, and when it comes back we will be letting women know about it.

"However, we will emphasise that its suitability depends on how important efficacy is to them - in other words, how much will it matter if they become pregnant. The failure rate should be taken into account. If a women has had problems getting pregnant in the past, so knows that she is less fertile, this might well be a good solution for her."

For young women and women not in a long-term relationship, the sponge would not be recommended, not only because of its 91 per cent success rate, but because it offers little protection against STDs.

"But it is very popular for women aged 35 and over, who are in long-term relationships, and who are worried about taking hormones into their bodies, particularly for a long period of time," Hearton says.

Juliet Wilkinson from south London used to use the Today Sponge and looks forward to its return. "My mother has had breast cancer so, rightly or wrongly, I am wary of the Pill. My husband and I have fallen into using the withdrawal method because we've been through every imaginable contraceptive possibility.

"I used to love the way the sponge was so unmessy and you could almost forget about it until you had to take it out. I can't wait till it's back." Her husband Tony is just as keen, although "there was a downside. It tastes pretty awful."