Live data from Hacker News

Sperm counts worldwide are plummeting faster than we thought

nationalgeographic.com

131–140 of 1001 posts

Re: Sperm counts worldwide are plummeting faster than we thought

#131
post #112

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I get reliably downvoted for suggesting this, but we need vastly better labelling across the board. We give companies a lot of leeway when it comes to selling things to put in and on our bodies without us, owners of said bodies, having any way of finding out what the hell is in their products, or where they came from, or how they were processed. It absolutely baffles me how everyone doesn't want considerably more inf…

I would be massively in favour of adding a QR Code that details as much as possible (without giving away trade secrets if that is possible) where and how something is sourced and then adding how it was processed. Much like you get a track and trace with a package.

Who cares about hiding trade secrets if those trade secrets are "just a pinch of mercury" or some other nefarious chemical.

Re: Sperm counts worldwide are plummeting faster than we thought

#132

It is interesting, I have a friend group that consists of about 5 married couples all of whom have been having issues conceiving and have been trying for a while now, but are still having issues. Curiously enough my wife and I just had our 4th and every time we've conceived within two months (even when I was hoping it would take a little longer). From what I hear our friends story is not unusual and many in our age b…

n=1 but with my daughter we had issues and ended up resorting to IVF. During the "issues" phase my count was tested and was considered good...problem is/was on my wife's side...all to say conception issues aren't all down to sperm counts (not that you implied that, just wanted it out there).

better phrasing: while trying to conceive our daughter :)

Re: Sperm counts worldwide are plummeting faster than we thought

#134
Is exposure to plastics a risk factor? I might be handling a lot of library books and those books are often wrapped in polyurethane to help protect the covers. Over years, are there any health risks to that?

Example of the protective covers:

https://youtu.be/v-ZnoPHCtxI

Re: Sperm counts worldwide are plummeting faster than we thought

#135

> Swan also recommends reducing exposure to endocrine-disrupting chemicals by being a savvy consumer Most hygiene products get away with listing diethyl phthalate as 'Parfum'. What we need is not savvy consumers what we need is regulators to get serious.

I agree with you, but I don't know how helpful this will end up being.

Endocrine disruptors are airborne and globally ubiquitous in the form of micro-plastics. All drinking water in the world is contaminated with it. [1]

I'm really not meaning to be dramatic on this, but we've completely missed the boat on this one while we were arguing about climate change, and it's much too late to do anything about it now.[2]

I'll not be here to see either way, and it's unlikely anyone else currently alive will unless Ray Kurzweil was right this whole time, but IMHO (I.e. take this with the pinch of salt a random Internet comment warrants) it's likely humanity as a species only has a few hundred years left at most.

This isn't meant to be doom-mongering, it's just that while we worry about some dramatic cataclysmic event like a nuclear war, a pandemic or a meteor strike, the science seems to indicate it's much more likely that humanity will die off with a quiet whimper in a few generations.

It's worth noting that this is not a mainstream view, and that the UN projects a level population out to 2300 [3] - I just don't see that the science backs up this claim, especially given recent understandings of fertility decline.

[https://cdn.who.int/media/docs/default-source/wash-documents...]

[https://www.salon.com/2022/01/16/bpa-plastics-harmful/]

[https://www.un.org/development/desa/pd/sites/www.un.org.deve...]

Re: Sperm counts worldwide are plummeting faster than we thought

#136
post #112

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I get reliably downvoted for suggesting this, but we need vastly better labelling across the board. We give companies a lot of leeway when it comes to selling things to put in and on our bodies without us, owners of said bodies, having any way of finding out what the hell is in their products, or where they came from, or how they were processed. It absolutely baffles me how everyone doesn't want considerably more inf…

I would be massively in favour of adding a QR Code that details as much as possible (without giving away trade secrets if that is possible) where and how something is sourced and then adding how it was processed. Much like you get a track and trace with a package.

That's a pretty clever idea. I like it! There is limited package space on items, this would allow producers to document a whole lot of info and allow consumers immediate access.

Re: Sperm counts worldwide are plummeting faster than we thought

#137
post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well I mean, given the public discourse of the past decade...it seems to me that they want the population to decline. So it makes sense that no one has in interest in investigating this.

"they want the population to decline" Who is "they"?

>the media and academia

Re: Sperm counts worldwide are plummeting faster than we thought

#138
post #43

The lack of federally funded research on this topic is astounding. It's been like this for a long time, but ignored. Even more notably has been the lack of curiosity from the media and academia. They simply shrug and move on, as if the root cause of this isn't something we should look into as potentially causing other problems that are even worse. Edit: The downvotes without any comment refuting this highlight the is…

How do you determine that? As far as I have heard from people working in fertilization clinics, they can help pretty much all couples that have problems with conceiving due to male fertility issues. You need to go there in the first place, but once you request help, you get it.

Re: Sperm counts worldwide are plummeting faster than we thought

#139

But are they? https://news.harvard.edu/gazette/story/2021/05/fears-over-fa...

A study not written by a scientist to oppose scientists. Allowing literature/philosophy people to publish on everything is as bad as allowing antivaxxers everywhere.

It's not saying the study is flat-out wrong. It's critiquing specific aspects of its reasoning and categorization. Not at all comparable to antivaxxers.
Post reply on HN