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Male infertility rate on the rise in Shanghai

By Qian Yanfeng (China Daily)
Updated: 2009-04-02 09:34

SHANGHAI: In an increasingly mobile and competitive world, even one's manhood is under threat. Forget about grooming or making more money. It's time men started watching out for their sperm.

Experts say at least 100,000 men in Shanghai are suffering from infertility, because of the ever-worsening environmental pollution as well as unhealthy lifestyle under higher work pressure.

Radiation from cellphones, computers and other electronic devices, air, water and food pollution, combined with the sedentary lifestyle followed in cities are to blame for a possible "quality decline" of the sperm, which may, in turn, lead to men's poor reproductive capability. Li Zheng, a urologist from Shanghai Jiao Tong University affiliated Renji Hospital, told China Daily yesterday.

He said he had observed less sperm motility in men's semen and even some change in the sperms' morphology over the years, which may affect successful conceptions.

"About 50 percent of failures to achieve pregnancy is due to an abnormality or possibly an absence of sperm in the male partner's semen," Li said.

"The social significance of such a problem is obviously very huge. Since many of today's young couples are the only child of their parents, they are under pressure from their parents to have children."

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Across China, an estimated 8 to 10 percent of the reproductive population is now experiencing problems having children, Li added.

Li, also director of Shanghai Sperm Bank, said the number of couples wanting to have children through artificial insemination is on the rise, although the number of donated sperm is not enough to meet the demand.

The rate of a successful sperm donation is only 1 to 2 percent, said Li, adding that in the bank's more than five-year history only 1,000 or so people qualified as donors, who have to be "both physically and mentally" healthy.

But sperm donation is still seen as a social taboo, the reason why Li has been encouraging more people, especially college students who are more open to new ideas, to do what they can to help.

"It's for public good," said Zhang Wei, a postgraduate student who works with Li at the sperm bank. "Think of those people who are unable to have children. They really need help." Li also thinks that men should be more aware of preserving their sperm before any potential threat affects the quality. He advised people with testis cancers, firemen and astronauts, as well as those involved in occupation in radiology, to extract and conserve their sperm for future use.