Is The Internet Bad For Sperm?
Those little swimmers -- and his fertility -- are negatively affected by Wi-Fi signals, study says.
Warning: What you're about to read is shocking. So shocking you may try to keep your guy away from his laptop for at least a week.
A new study in the journal Fertility and Sterility has found that men who place their laptops on their laps are toying with the quality of their sperm. Officially, researchers say, "Our data suggest that the use of a laptop computer wirelessly connected to the Internet and positioned near the male reproductive organs may decrease human sperm quality." Yikes!
Researchers came upon this discovery by testing semen samples from 29 healthy men. They placed drops of sperm under a laptop that was connected to the Internet via Wi-Fi. Then, they downloaded something. Within four hours, a quarter of the samples were no longer swimming around; only 14 percent of semen samples stored away from the computer suffered the same fate. What's worse? Nine percent of the Wi-Fi subjected sperm showed DNA damage!
Sperm spoiling is thought to happen at the hands of electromagnetic radiation, which is generated during wireless communication.
A fix for this problem is pretty simple — keep your laptops off your laps, dudes! Overall, however, technology's effect on testicles and sperm is somewhat troubling. For instance, one study found that men who rest their laptops on their knees are exposing their scrotums to dangerously high temperatures, which in term has a damaging effect on sperm. Even cell phones are bad news — radiation from a phone stored in a pant pocket is bad for semen quality. Add that to these most recent findings, and it's not looking good for couples looking to get pregnant. Diabetes May Be Damaging Men’s Sperm: Study
Will you be keeping laptops away from your guy's lap now?