I don't believe what I'm reading. Give up your life as you know it or live with the guilt of "not being there", + the social and financial stigma that comes with it?
No risks? You must be joking.
Since the subjects here are otherwise healthy men, who have other options for avoiding pregnancy, the DSMB should be fairly risk adverse and willing to kill the trial (as happened here). If, on the other hand, the trial were testing a new kind of anti-cancer therapy on patients with terminal cancer, the Board might be willing to tolerate a few more adverse events because the pay-off s are much higher.
The article seems to be saying, in a ham-fisted way, that the DSMB would have tolerated slightly more risk to women because pregnancy also carries its own risks.
The biological consequences, on the other hand, are certain and universal.