- Regular mobile phone use can reduce a man's sperm count
by up to 30 per cent, a study shows. Even carrying a handset in a belt
or trouser pocket can affect male fertility, it suggests.
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- Experts believe radiation from mobile phones has a dramatic
impact on the numbers of sperm, and their swimming ability, both of which
are linked to successful conception.
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- The study, being presented this week at the annual meeting
of the European Society of Human Reproduction and Embryology (ESHRE) in
Berlin, adds to the health concerns about mobile-phone use.
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- Scientists called the results "interesting"
but said the study raised more questions than it answered. Dr Imre Fejes,
from the University of Szeged in Hungary, studied 221 men over 13 months
and compared the sperm of "very active" mobile users, who carried
their handset for most of the day, with those who did not own a phone.
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- Dr Fejes found men who carried a phone on stand-by through
the day had significantly lower sperm concentration. Their counts averaged
at 59 million sperm per millilitre of seminal fluid compared with 83 million
for men not continually exposed to mobile phone radiation.
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- Motility - the power of the sperm to swim - was similarly
affected by mobile phone transmissions, the study found. Men who made lengthy
calls had fewer rapidly motile sperm, 36.3 per cent compared with 51.3
per cent for men who made no calls.
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- The research is the first to show that male fertility
may be damaged by electromagnetic signals from mobile phones. Dr Fejes
said: "Prolonged use of cellphones may have a negative effect on spermatogenesis
and male fertility that presumably deteriorates both concentration and
motility." But he admitted that further studies were necessary to
confirm the results.
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- Experts have been unable to make firm conclusions about
the safety of mobile phones because study findings have been so contradictory.
The Government has adopted a "precautionary" approach, offering
advice aimed at reducing the mobile-phone exposure of children. A major
obstacle is that mobile phones have been in use for only 15 years, and
it may take more time for long-term health effects to become apparent.
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- Professor Hans Evers, a leading gynaecologist from the
Academic Hospital in Maastricht, the Netherlands, questioned whether the
results could have been influenced by lifestyle, social background and
age. "This research ... raises more questions than it answers,"
Professor Evers said. "It is an observational as opposed to interventional
study which appears not to take into account the many potential confounding
factors which could have skewed the results. For example, what if heavy
mobile phone users in Hungary have particularly stressful lives and jobs?
What if they come from a different age group or social class than the non-users?
These factors would have a considerable effect on the outcome of the research."
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- © 2004 Independent Digital (UK) Ltd
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- http://news.independent.co.uk/uk/health_medical/story.jsp?story=535756
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