Cannot get pregnant? Male infertility is on the rise, with smoking, stress, obesity, hormones, and alcohol and drug abuse all likely factors, doctors say
- Male infertility is as likely to be what’s stopping a couple conceiving as female infertility. Stress, obesity, low testosterone and smoking are likely causes
- Men need to think about developing healthy sperm months before they plan on trying to father a baby, doctors say. They could also seek help for health problems
Writing on an online forum, Karen is distressed at her inability to conceive. Her anguish is no surprise.
What might be a surprise, though, is that the fertility issues in her case lie not with her, but with her husband.
“I was shocked. I don’t know what to think. I have obviously heard of infertility in women, but men?” Karen wrote.
Infertility affects up to 15 per cent of couples globally. Historically, problems with fertility have been considered to lie with women. That male infertility accounts for up to 50 per cent of all infertility cases is not so widely known.
Men themselves are reluctant to address their fertility for fear of feeling emasculated.
Professor Richard Pilsner’s laboratory at Wayne State University School of Medicine in Detroit, in the US state of Michigan, focuses on taking a paternal perspective to reproductive health by seeking to understand the role of sperm.