Free The Hormone Factory by Saskia Goldschmidt Page A

succeeded in getting a foothold in Argentina. He had gone there to make a deal with a firm that had thousands of kilos of pancreas to sell us. The “sweetbreads,” as we called the gland, had to be deep-frozen for the trip to the Netherlands. We were forced to start importing the stuff because of the growing demand for insulin; the amount produced at our own plant was no longer anywhere near adequate. Then, having made the Argentinians curious as to what on earth we neededtheir waste product for, Aaron, capitalizing on that interest, created a demand for our insulin in that country.
    Furthermore, I didn’t shrink from taking draconian measures when necessary. So for several years in a row I would fire a large segment of our workforce just before Christmas, only to rehire them in the new year. It wasn’t very nice for them, but had I not done so, I wouldn’t have been able to offer them any work that year.
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    After many successful experiments on animals, in which sterilized young mice and rabbits went into heat after being given the new substance, and those squirmy little creatures showed themselves ready and willing to procreate, the moment was at hand when the white powder was ready to be tested on humans.
    “A critical juncture!” Levine announced, explaining to me that the compound, sterilized and packaged in a special “clean room,” would first be administered to women with menstrual problems. The first vials would go out to a select group of clinicians, with instructions to administer it in minute doses. These trials called for the utmost prudence, since one couldn’t be certain that a real, live woman would react the same way as a mouse or a rabbit.
    The physician was asked to carefully record how many units the patient was given, what changes occurred in the woman’s body, and to note any side effects, since it was difficult to ascertain these in lab mammals. Through this process Levine and his team would gradually achieve a better understanding of how the preparation worked.
    Levine’s extreme caution in these clinical trials severely tried my patience, never one of my strongest qualities. Of course innocent people ought not to be frivolously exposed tounacceptable risk, but still, it was the De Paauw Slaughterhouse and Meatpacking Co. that was bankrolling all this research, a huge investment that had to be recouped as rapidly as possible. Levine always put his rigid dedication to science and his moral principles ahead of everything else; commercial considerations often came last as far as he was concerned.
    I was exceptionally interested in the testing of our rutting hormone. Providing the world with life-giving drugs would put us on at least an equal footing with God. Would it really be possible to resuscitate a barren womb, to repair a set of faulty ovaries, and to eventually help an infertile woman conceive? And—holy cow!—would we someday have a way to prevent a pregnancy? After all, our own Ruth wasn’t the only kid to come into this world unplanned. How many people are there who started off in life as an accident, the result of a moment of lust or lack of self-control, the living result of an expert seduction or a brutal rape? Hasn’t mankind attempted since time immemorial to find a way to forestall pregnancy? All over the world women have tried every method under the sun to prevent conception—stuffing their nether parts with leaves, fruits, or even crocodile dung, for instance, in hopes of being spared yet another mouth to suckle, feed, and protect.
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    Levine one day asked me to join him at his favorite Amsterdam establishment, the restaurant with the German name, to give me an update on his research on hormones, which he had started calling “soul glands.” The more that was known about these compounds, the clearer it became that they not only were responsible for the organ’s own function, but had a marked influence on the overall workings of the human body as