Mobile phones wreaking havoc with sperm
Tuesday Oct 24 17:00 AEST

By ninemsn staff

Mobile phones are a serious hazard for sperm, according to a new US study which shows fertility plummets in men who use their mobiles a lot.

The study, released at a medical conference in New Orleans this week, demonstrated a clear connection between hours spent chatting on a mobile and sparse and lazy sperm.

Men who used mobile phones for more than four hours a day were found to have 25 percent lower sperm count than men who never used a mobile.

The sperm quality was also poorer in those who frequently used mobiles, with the sperm swimming ability — a crucial factor in conception — down by a third.

Professor Ashok Agarwal, who led the study that tested 360 men from the US and India, told The Daily Mail that electromagnetic radiation emitted by handsets may be damaging cells vital to fertility.

"These cells in the testes have been shown to be susceptible to electromagnetic waves in previous research in animals," said Professor Ashok Agarwal, director of the Reproductive Research Centre in Ohio.

"Somehow electromagnetic waves may be causing direct damage to these cells and that perhaps causes a decrease in sperm production," he said.

There are also fears that a mobile may increase temperature in the groin if carried in the hip-pocket.

"Sperm is very temperature sensitive as shown by many studies, and a short-term rise in temperature could be responsible," Professor Agarwal said.

However, Allan Pacey, senior lecturer in andrology at the University of Sheffield, says he doesn't think the results are proof that mobiles are decreasing fertility rates in men.

He believes there could be other explanations for the findings.

"Maybe people who use a phone for four hours a day spend more time sitting in cars, which could mean there’s a heat issue. It could be they are more stressed, or more sedentary and sit about eating junk food getting fat. Those seem to be better explanations than a phone causing the damage at such a great distance" Pacey said.

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