The difficult birth of a Cern scientist’s contraception app

An app that aims to help prevent or plan pregnancy has attracted €38 million in funding - and considerable controversy, writes Esmé E Deprez

Raoul Scherwitzl and Elina Berglund, the couple who founded Natural Cycles

Late one evening in February, Raoul Scherwitzl posted a tweet that, even in this age of oversharing, might have seemed a little too personal. He and his wife, Elina Berglund, would stop trying to avoid pregnancy and begin trying to have a baby.

“As of now, the founders of Natural Cycles are switching from Prevent to Plan,” he wrote from Stockholm. “May the odds be in our favour.”

Natural Cycles is the fertility-tracking ...