Under pressure from Congress, the FDA will relent on Friday and pledge to approve a controversial device designed to allow men to perform a vasectomy on themselves without any supervision. XSurgical Devices, Inc. designed the Home Vasectomy Device (HVD) in 2002, but it has been stalled in stage three trials for 18 months due to what some have characterized as FDA stonewalling. James Horton, a spokesman for the FDA, will break the news at a press conference this Friday afternoon. “Although many in the FDA can’t fathom why a man would want to perform any operation on his own reproductive system, we can find no safety problems with the device that haven’t been addressed thoroughly by XSurgical’s reports. It is with some amount of trepidation that we’re going to approve this device.”

Wall Street will react sharply to the news, XSurgical’s stock (XSGD) will surge in early trading on Monday then retreat later in the week. One investor will cite his reason for staying away, “My firm is not sure that it’s going to pack the same punch that it used to. XSGD was a stronger company years ago, but this new gadget might show a weakness in the market the last few XSurg devices suffered. It’s like the company is shooting blanks, only time will tell if it can still perform.”