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Sperm counts worldwide are plummeting faster than we thought

nationalgeographic.com

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Re: Sperm counts worldwide are plummeting faster than we thought

#471

Post by OJFord »

someweirdperson wrote: post #311
UweSchmidt wrote: post #273

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Regarding tea bags, sometimes I see plastic tea bags which are crazy, as they must have a weak structure/large surface and the hot water surely washes out a lot of plastic. I am assuming the normal paper tea bags I get in Germany with a metal clip should be plastic free though, or am I missing something? Yes we are down to discussing tea bag brands now but as you are saying, it's an emergency :-(

Tea bags are a useless convenience. In bulk tea is not only significantly cheaper (not as bad as the tea capsule mark-up, which is in a league oo its own), but also waste is reduced to nothing (only the tea itself, which is perfectly organic). Rinsing a reusible tea holder doesn't take more time than it takes to dispose off the paper tied to the end separately.

> Tea bags are a useless convenience.

Surely an oxymoron?

(I don't really drink tea fwiw; if I did I probably would be the type to get into it with loose leaves sourced from somewhere I believed to be better than anything available in bags (not even because of the plastic or whatever in bags).)

Re: Sperm counts worldwide are plummeting faster than we thought

#472

Post by AdrianB1 »

bowsamic wrote: post #15
willcipriano wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Do you intend to become elderly? Perhaps not so great news in 50 years when you are looking for a nursing home.

I'll just make enough money to pay for a good nursing home

Your money will have to be worth something and nursing homes to still exist in a world without children. Imagine everyone stops having children tomorrow and make a point for that case, then accept some will have a few kids - that is an improvement but is that enough?

Re: Sperm counts worldwide are plummeting faster than we thought

#473

Post by Aeolun »

bergenty wrote: post #442
PakG1 wrote: post #156

My wife and I have a beautiful daughter about to turn 2. But she wouldn't have existed if it weren't for IVF (in vitro fertilization). Had to stab her stomach with needles for a while to make hormones to mass produce eggs and then they took my sperm to put into her eggs and see which ones took. Five viable pairings happened. Three were put into her and out came the one kid. Other two are in cryo for future use, and h…

You may not like to hear this but women having a kid past 30 introduces a lot of potential problems and deficiencies in the child.

It increases the chances. It doesn’t guarantee it by any measure.

Only past 40 do you go into ‘really need to check’ territory.

Re: Sperm counts worldwide are plummeting faster than we thought

#474

Post by duffyjp »

Aeolun wrote: post #440
droopyEyelids wrote: post #429

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Fertility isn't the only consideration with having children when you're old. Skin elasticity and athleticism decreases with age, and that translates into worse tearing, and more difficult births, longer recovery, and more trouble keeping up with a baby after all that. Then, on top of all that, your parents are entering their sunset years rather where you have to help them rather than having grandparents young enough…

Can you imagine having two generations of kids at 20 years old? ‘Grandma’ will be 40 when she has her first grandkid.

I'm 41 and my boys are 4 and 8. It's wild to even consider I could have been a grandfather by now if my life choices had been different. Wouldn't be such a bad thing though, at 40 you're still pretty young so I could've had my freedom back by now. As it is I'll be 55 by the time they're out of the house and probably won't be able to pick mountain biking back up...

And then if they wait a while I could be pushing 70 before my grandkids arrive. Great-grandkids might be a relic of a time gone by...

Re: Sperm counts worldwide are plummeting faster than we thought

#475

Post by onion2k »

BeFlatXIII wrote: post #402
thehappypm wrote: post #336

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Another lesson from your story (similar to many of my friends’) is to just have kids younger. It sounds like you started at around 35 — if people started at 30, even, fertility is higher.

We have a societal problem when the rational individual choice (to provide your children the best head start) is to wait until your fertility declines to have children.

...rational individual choice...

It's a choice in the same sense that I've chosen not to buy a Ferrari because I can't afford one.

Re: Sperm counts worldwide are plummeting faster than we thought

#476

Post by IfOnlyYouKnew »

Aeolun wrote: post #464
PakG1 wrote: post #406

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Adopting is hard. I've tried to convince my wife that we should adopt because I've always wanted to adopt anyway, but she's scared I'm not taking it seriously enough. She says with adoption, you need to emotionally commit more than you would with your own blood because the natural instinct isn't there. She's scared I can't handle the responsibility and she might be scared of it too. She said we can have the talk agai…

I’m always surprised that they think they’re the only ones that care. Just because it doesn’t show in the same way doesn’t mean I don’t care. My wife’s care consists of endlessly fuzzing over every little detail of their appearance when going out. Mine consists of ensuring he’s happy and fed. Personally my issue with adoption is that I do not want to be in a position where I treat my own child and the adopted one dif…

"They"?

Re: Sperm counts worldwide are plummeting faster than we thought

#477

Post by UncleOxidant »

PakG1 wrote: post #156

My wife and I have a beautiful daughter about to turn 2. But she wouldn't have existed if it weren't for IVF (in vitro fertilization). Had to stab her stomach with needles for a while to make hormones to mass produce eggs and then they took my sperm to put into her eggs and see which ones took. Five viable pairings happened. Three were put into her and out came the one kid. Other two are in cryo for future use, and h…

IVF is expensive. Some friends of ours tried it but it didn't work. They were out $30K and finally just made peace with the fact that they weren't going to have kids.

Re: Sperm counts worldwide are plummeting faster than we thought

#478

Post by Knufen »

I did my Master Degree in Organic Chemistry where we tried to develop a male contraceptive pill. I spend a lot of time studying sperm so here is a short list of thing to avoid regarding sperm quality (not ranked):

1. Eating and drinking from plastics (This includes aluminum cans which are plastic lined) [a]

2. Heating food in ANY type of plastic [a]

3. Caffein intake [b]

4. Sugar intake [c]

5. NOT exercising regularly [d]

6. Alcohol [e]

7. Age [f]

8. Stress [g]

9. Soy products or other natural products containing phytoestrogens [h]

I edited the comment to add point 8 and 9.

Funnily enough these goes for both genders regarding fertility. If you are considering having a child, it takes approximately 7 months for sperm to fully develop so better to change lifestyle sooner rather than later.

a. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3222987 b. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5482951/ c. https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/35606632/ d. https://rep.bioscientifica.com/view/journals/rep/153/2/157.x... e. https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/28029592/ f. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3253726/ g. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6260894/ h. https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/18650557/

Re: Sperm counts worldwide are plummeting faster than we thought

#479

Post by arglebargle123 »

ed25519FUUU wrote: post #439
cortesoft wrote: post #385

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Having kids younger is not a simple choice. My wife was already 35 when we met, we couldn't have started younger.

I think the idea is that many societal choices need to be moved up, not just the decision to have children.

For that to be viable people need to A: not leave academia with 5-15y of debt as a matter of course and B: housing suitable for young families needs to, I don't know, actually exist where the decent jobs are. Until those changes happen kids aren't going to be a popular choice before one (or more likely both) parents have a well established career and significant amounts of money in the bank.

Re: Sperm counts worldwide are plummeting faster than we thought

#480

Post by waboremo »

BeFlatXIII wrote: post #402
thehappypm wrote: post #336

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Another lesson from your story (similar to many of my friends’) is to just have kids younger. It sounds like you started at around 35 — if people started at 30, even, fertility is higher.

We have a societal problem when the rational individual choice (to provide your children the best head start) is to wait until your fertility declines to have children.

While true, the desire to push everyone into heavy productivity mode from ages 18-55 are a societal problem, there is also a financial (and educational) problem where solutions to combat the aging fertility problem are often locked behind procedures that cost more than a year's salary for majority of people.

An example of this is that freezing your eggs costs upwards of $30k, and is still viewed as something only very select late 30's successful women do.

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