- Male fertility isn't what it used to be: sperm counts
have halved in 50 years and disorders of the reproductive system are on
the increase. What's causing the 'feminisation' of men?
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- In 1991, a Danish scientist presented the results of
a study to a World Health Organisation conference, showing that the sperm
counts of Western men had fallen by about a half over the previous 50 years.
Professor Niels Skakkebaek of the University of Copenhagen could offer
no explanation for the findings, but neither could he dismiss them as a
mere statistical fluke. More than a decade later, scientists are still
trying to explain the apparent feminisation of modern man.
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- There is now mounting evidence that something quite serious
is happening to male fertility, and not just in sperm counts. It encompasses
a range of disorders of the male reproductive system, and medical researchers
have even coined a name for it - testicular dysgenesis syndrome.
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- The syndrome is a collection of disorders that manifest
themselves at one of two stages in life. At birth, it appears as cryptorchidism
- the incomplete descent of the one testis or both testes into the scrotum
- or a disorder of the penis in which the opening does not develop at the
tip, a disfigurement called hypospadia. Later in life, after adolescence,
testicular dysgenesis syndrome can appear as more generalised disorders
such as low sperm counts, infertility, or cancer of the testes.
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- There is ample data to suggest that these disorders are
on the increase. Cryptorchidism is the most common congenital malformation
in children of either sex, affecting between 2 and 4 per cent of baby boys,
and hypospadias are the second most common congenital malformation in children.
Low sperm counts now affect up to one in five young men, and testicular
cancer is the most common cancer of young men, and its incidence has increased
steadily over the past 60 years. In fact, were it not for the fact that
testicular cancer is so curable, it would be the biggest killer of young
men after road-traffic accidents, according to Dr Richard Sharpe, a male-fertility
specialist at the Medical Research Council's Human Reproductive Sciences
Unit in Edinburgh.
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- Sharpe is one of several experts in the field who believe
that there could be a common basis for all these different problems of
the male reproductive system. He suggests that all the disorders stem from
a problem arising at the key stage in the development of the male foetus
during early pregnancy. "From epidemiological studies, we know that
each of the disorders is a risk factor for all the others, and that they
share several pregnancy-related risk factors," Sharpe says. "Most
importantly, we know that they share hormonal risk factors, in particular
anything that interferes with the production or action of androgens and
testosterone [the male sex hormones] during the sexual differentiation
process of the foetus that occurs in the womb."
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- In other words, the suggestion is that there is something
happening early in the development of the male foetus that interferes with
the key steps enabling it to develop into a healthy, fertile male. Ever
since Professor Skakkebaek made his discovery on sperm counts, environmentalists
have suggested that it could be "gender-bending" chemicals -
endocrine disrupters - in the environment that are the cause of the gradual
feminisation of men. But despite intense research to find these endocrine
disrupters, the precise reasons for the problems have not so far been identified.
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- Some scientists believe that the culprit may just as
likely be a change in lifestyle, rather than exposure to some new environmental
chemical. John Ashby, from the Syngenta Central Toxicology Laboratory in
Macclesfield, says that the focus on an environmental cause may be quite
wrong. "The human [reproductive] conditions cannot at the moment be
associated with a named chemical," says Ashby. "There are many
lifestyle changes that could be contributing to these conditions, for instance
increased smoking among young women."
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- Another possible lifestyle factor that could be playing
a role is the significant increase in the intake of dietary fat over the
past 50 years. Fat is linked with oestrogens - the female sex hormone -
and more fat means more oestrogens, which means a possible increase in
the risk of interference with the proper development of male reproductive
organs. "The trends on dietary fat are up, and the implications are
great for endocrine disruption," says Ashby.
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- Nevertheless, work on animals has led to the discovery
of some chemicals in the environment that could be playing an important
role. Sharpe cites his work on chemicals called phthalates, substances
used by industry to soften plastics. He has been able to create a set of
disorders in laboratory animals that mimic human testicular dysgenesis
syndrome by exposing pregnant mothers to certain phthalate esters at a
key stage of foetal development.
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- "Phthalates are the most common environmental chemical.
They are in the air around us," says Sharpe. However, he points out,
it is too early to jump to the conclusion that this is the cause of the
problem. "At present, doses that are 100- to 500-fold higher than
the highest reported human exposure are required to induce such effects,
and we do not have any proof that phthalates can induce such effects in
humans," he says. "Nevertheless, phthalates are everywhere in
our environment, we are all exposed, and the highest exposure appears to
be in young women of reproductive age."
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- But although the jury is out in terms of what is causing
the reproductive problems among humans, the same is not the case for the
feminisation documented among wildlife, according to Professor Peter Matthiessen
of the Centre for Ecology and Hydrology, Windermere. "People are cautious
about saying that there are definite effects on humans, but we have hard
evidence for effects on wildlife in all groups, from invertebrates to mammals,"
he says. "It's a real-world issue, not just a theoretical worry. It's
actually happening. The effects range from relatively trivial biochemical
changes, probably of no ecological significance, to huge changes in populations
and communities of organisms."
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- Most work has centred on the rise of hermaphrodite fish
in British rivers, which seems to have happened as a result of the increase
in natural and synthetic oestrogens pouring into the aquatic environment
from sewage effluent. "Most of the effects seem to be occurring in
the aquatic environment. We're not sure why. It might be due to not enough
work being done in the terrestrial environment, but I think it is a genuine
effect and something do to with the exposure of water-breathers,"
says Matthiessen.
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- The contraceptive pill being flushed down the toilet
is one obvious reason for the increase in oestrogens in the environment.
Natural oestrogens break down relatively easily, but synthetic oestrogens
are designed to withstand the rigours of the human intestine - the same
traits that prevent them from being broken down by microbes in sewage-treatment
works.
-
- The crucial question is whether this environmental chemical,
or any others suspected of being endocrine disrupters, are actually getting
back into the human food chain to affect foetal development in pregnant
women.
-
- Richard Sharpe is keen to assert the importance of not
jumping to conclusions. "I'm concerned that people run away and say
that because we are investigating something, and because it can cause a
similar disorder in animals, then it must cause it in humans," he
says. It is in everyone's interest to focus on the disorder rather than
on the potential culprits, he says. "If we assume guilt, the real
culprit may be able to carry on causing harm while we get side-tracked."
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- Although scientists have made great strides in understanding
endocrine disruption since Professor Skakkebaek's sperm-count study was
first brought to the public's attention in 1991, they have still a long
way to go before they can explain what is actually happening to the fertility
of the human male.
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- © 2004 Independent Digital (UK) Ltd
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- http://news.independent.co.uk/world/science_medical/story.jsp?story=487472
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- Comment
- From Sheryl Jackson
- 2-4-4
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- www.westonaprice.org/soy/soy_alert.html
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- This site gives medical facts that GM food from the Monsters
of Monsanto are causing secondary female sexual characteristics in men
and children. That is why the GM's are being fed to us. To keep man docile
and sweet and to send us to the doctors regularly so they can use their
NUCLEAR MEDICINE to kill us..........oops..........I mean make us well........
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- The monsters of Monsanto forgot that wymyn are in charge
of most things. We also are more capable of bearing heartache and pain.
Though I doubt that most men wish to become wymyn.
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- Beer also contains hops which have a phytoestrogen in
them that is transferred to the beer. How many male beer drinkers have
shown enlarged breasts? Breast cancer in men has risen 5000% in the last
ten years.
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- Genetically Modified foods are the bain of the population.
Read about the McDonalds Debacle from the man who ate nothing else for
a month. Put on 25 pounds and his young healthy body deteriorated so dramatically
that he was in physical jeopardy after only a month. And this is what parents
feed their children.
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- GM's cause brain tumors and brain cancers, Multiple Sclerosis,
leukemia, obesity, ADHD in children and adults, various aches and pains
that are not identifiable through diagnosis, carpal tunnel is worsened,
lethargy, apathy and depression.................. Need I say more?
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- Sheryl Jackson
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