When a couple cannot have offspring, those around them usually find the woman "guilty". It turns out that men face this problem more and more often. Why is this happening? What influences their potency and how is male infertility treated?
Medical statistics show that nearly 2.5 million Poles are unsuccessfully trying to have a child. The World He alth Organization (WHO) reports that the so-called the male factor in marital infertility is present in approx. 45%. cases, of which in approx. 20 percent. the reason for the difficulties in conceiving lies solely with the male.
But this data is for couples trying to conceive. In fact, it is difficult to say what the percentage of men affected by this problem is, because those gentlemen who do not have children and do not want to have children do not come for testing and often do not even know that they are sterile.
According to the definition of infertility, we mean that pregnancy does not occur within a year despite regular intercourse (2 or 3 times a week) without the use of contraceptive methods. Poor quality of sperm is more and more often mentioned among the reasons that make it impossible to have a child. But is it really so?
In 2010, the WHO proposed new (lower) semen standards. Many specialists believe that they have been lowered too much. However, WHO experts say that since men with even very low sperm counts can be fathers, there is no need to artificially raise the norm. Moreover, it was proved that it was not the deteriorating sperm parameters that led to lowering the recognized standards, but the knowledge that even with a small number of sperm, a man could become a father.
Scientists, however, are trying to prove that the quality of male sperm is getting worse. This is due to the overlapping of many factors, such as environmental pollution, sexually transmitted infections and infections, birth defects of the genital organs, certain chronic diseases, obesity, but also stress and poor diet. Views on this subject are shared by specialists. But none of them deny the fact that an increasing number of men have problems conceiving a child.
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