# Coke spermicide and air in the vagina **URL:** \ **Category:** Cecil's Columns/Staff Reports\ **Created:** [March 8, 2001, 3:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/coke-spermicide-and-air-in-the-vagina/57187 "2001-03-08T03:17:01Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 9\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![minty\_green](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/f6c823/32.png) [@minty\_green](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/minty_green)\ **Post date:** [March 8, 2001, 3:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/coke-spermicide-and-air-in-the-vagina/57187/1 "2001-03-08T03:17:01Z")
[Cecil says blowing air into a vagina can cause death by embolism.](http://www.straightdope.com/classics/a2_210.html) [Cecil says Coca Cola can be a spermicide of indeterminate efficacy.](http://www.straightdope.com/classics/a2_218b.html) [Snopes.com expands on the Coke spermicide,](http://www.snopes2.com/pregnant/pregnant.htm#pregnant) claiming: > [@](#): > > After intercourse, the girl would uncap a warm Coke, put her thumb over the mouth of the bottle, shake up the beverage, then insert the neck of the bottle in her vagina and move her thumb out of the way. The warm well-shaken Coke became an effervescent spermicidal douche, with the traditional (at that time) six-ounce bottle providing what was deemed to be just the right amount for one application. Sounds like a whole lot of internal CO2 to me. So … if anybody had ever actually done this, they’d be risking a particularly appropriate Darwin Award, right? Cecil, you’ve already proven Marilyn Vos Savant to be a lightweight. Do I have to start doubting snopes too? ---
**Author:** ![Duck\_Duck\_Goose](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/50afbb/32.png) [@Duck\_Duck\_Goose](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Duck_Duck_Goose)\ **Post date:** [March 8, 2001, 1:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/coke-spermicide-and-air-in-the-vagina/57187/2 "2001-03-08T13:42:42Z")
Morning, Minty. Er, not quite clear on what point you’re making. Are you saying you think Snopes is endorsing this? Are you saying Snopes is less than accurate because they don’t mention the carbon dioxide danger? What? 😕 ---
**Author:** ![minty\_green](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/f6c823/32.png) [@minty\_green](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/minty_green)\ **Post date:** [March 8, 2001, 1:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/coke-spermicide-and-air-in-the-vagina/57187/3 "2001-03-08T13:56:27Z")
Snopes says people actually used to do it. Cecil says it (well, not Coke specifically, but air) is life-threateningly dangeorous. One or the other of these assertions has to be false, it seems. So which is it? I’m betting on snopes being wrong, personally. ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [March 9, 2001, 3:16am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/coke-spermicide-and-air-in-the-vagina/57187/4 "2001-03-09T03:16:22Z")
Is it possible that the composition of the gas matters, and that air is dangerous, but CO[sub]2[/sub] is not? If I’m not mistaken, there are several foaming agents on the market as spermacides, under FDA approval, so there’s presumably some safe gasses. It’s also possible (I was going to say conceivable) that embolism is only a significant risk for pregnant women, who would presumably not be using a spermacide (improvised or intended) anyway. ---
**Author:** ![minty\_green](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/f6c823/32.png) [@minty\_green](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/minty_green)\ **Post date:** [March 9, 2001, 3:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/coke-spermicide-and-air-in-the-vagina/57187/5 "2001-03-09T03:56:58Z")
I thought of both possibilities, **Chronos** , but didn’t know what to make of them. Cecil himself said the risk of embolism with non-pregnant women was less well-known, but still advised against taking the risk. I don’t have any idea how CO2 interacts with blood vessels. My impression is that CO2 injected straight into a vein would be a really bad thing, but I don’t know whether it would be absorbed through the “vein sinuses of the intrauterine wall.” But if an exhaled breath could do the trick, I don’t see why Coke fizz wouldn’t. Maybe a simpler way of approaching the question would be to ask whether anybody ever really did the fizzy douche thing that snopes describes. It does seem stupid and unlikely to me, which is why I doubted snopes on this count. ---
**Author:** ![Duck\_Duck\_Goose](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/50afbb/32.png) [@Duck\_Duck\_Goose](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Duck_Duck_Goose)\ **Post date:** [March 9, 2001, 2:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/coke-spermicide-and-air-in-the-vagina/57187/6 "2001-03-09T14:15:59Z")
Well, maybe it’s just that some women did it and got an embolism and died, and some women did it and didn’t get an embolism and didn’t die. We are also told, “Don’t drive too fast, you’ll flip your car and die,” and sometimes people drive too fast and flip their cars and die, and sometimes people drive too fast and flip their cars and don’t die. So. [shrug] Growing up in the 60s, I heard it said, “Yeah, you can douche with Coke and you won’t get pregnant,” but I never knew anybody who actually tried it. ---
**Author:** ![bibliophage](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bibliophage/32/7615_2.png) [@bibliophage](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bibliophage)\ **Post date:** [March 9, 2001, 3:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/coke-spermicide-and-air-in-the-vagina/57187/7 "2001-03-09T15:18:04Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Chronos \* > **Is it possible that the composition of the gas matters, and that air is dangerous, but CO[sub]2[/sub] is not** I thought of that too, but carbon dioxide embolisms do exist. They are, for example, a rare complication of laparoscopic and endoscopic surgery. Whether a cola douche would cause them is another question. ---
**Author:** ![thinksnow](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/thinksnow/32/2849_2.png) [@thinksnow](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/thinksnow)\ **Post date:** [March 12, 2001, 3:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/coke-spermicide-and-air-in-the-vagina/57187/8 "2001-03-12T15:32:48Z")
I had heard (read: no cite) that using a Coke-douche actually forced the semen further up in to the uterus, aiding fertilization…? This seems as good a place as any to ask if this is, in fact, true. [sub](if not, then ignore and go abotu your business, thank you)[/sub] ---
**Author:** ![Helen\_s\_Eidolon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/8edcca/32.png) [@Helen\_s\_Eidolon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Helen_s_Eidolon)\ **Post date:** [March 12, 2001, 7:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/coke-spermicide-and-air-in-the-vagina/57187/9 "2001-03-12T19:08:27Z")
Another possibility of difference is that we assume that when air is being blown in by a mouth, a seal is made, allowing the air to remain inside the body and enter veins. In the case of coke, it could just… exit the wway it came. Maybe that’s total nonsense, but it’s possible, I suppose.