The Rabbit Died 1928 – Pregnancy Tests Through the Ages

"Am I pregnant?" The answer to this question has long been a source of anxiety for women, their families, and doctors. Many misleading but inventive urine tests have been used. 

In ancient Egypt, women urinated on bags of wheat and barley. Supposedly, if the barley grew, a boy would be born; if the wheat grew, a girl would be born. If nothing grew, the woman was not pregnant. 

In more modern times, a woman's urine was injected into rabbits to test for pregnancy. This led to "the rabbit died" becoming a popular euphemism for a positive pregnancy test.

Today, many pregnancy tests are used to detect human chorionic gonadotropin (HCG), a hormone produced by the embryo approximately 6–12 days after the fertilized egg implants in the uterus. This hormone is later also secreted by the placenta. 

In 1928, German gynecologists Selmar Aschheim and Bernhard Zondek developed a pregnancy test in which a woman's urine was injected into an adolescent female mouse. If HCG was present in the urine, the mouse showed signs of ovulation, and the woman whose urine had been collected was told she was pregnant. 

Since all the rabbits were killed to examine their ovaries a few days after the urine injection, "the rabbit died" is a rather misleading expression. Tests were later developed in which female frogs could produce eggs within one day in response to HCG. In the 1970s, more accurate home tests were developed that used antibodies against HCG to indicate pregnancy. Depending on the type of test, a colored band or a (+) symbol indicated pregnancy.

Description of the Article Image: An oil painting (1660) by Dutch artist Jon Steen (1626–1679), depicting a woman awaiting her pregnancy test results

Historical Figures Mentioned in This Article: Selmar Aschheim (1878–1965), Bernhard Zondek (1891–1966)

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