Men May Be Less Fertile in The Aftermath of COVID-19 Infection, Scientists Warn

quote:

---

Men May Be Less Fertile in The Aftermath of COVID-19 Infection, Scientists Warn

MIKE MCRAE 3 FEBRUARY 2021

---

quote:

---

Scientists have suspected for some time that the novel SARS virus has the potential to wreak havoc with sperm counts. A review of the state of research, along with strong new evidence, emphasises the need to monitor men's reproductive systems as vulnerable routes for coronavirus infection.

Researchers from the Huazhong University of Science and Technology in Wuhan, China conducted an analysis of existing reports on possible mechanisms SARS-CoV-2 might employ to interfere with male reproduction.

---

quote:

---

Now, however, the weight of evidence appears now to be tipping well in favour of arguments that testicular tissue is commonly being damaged as a direct result of COVID.

A recently published longitudinal investigation conducted by researchers from Justus-Liebig-University in Germany and Allameh Tabataba'i University in Iran reports direct experimental evidence of just such damage.

Their study looked instead at inflammation markers in samples of tissue from 84 men diagnosed with COVID-19, alongside 105 controls. They also evaluated sperm quality and searched for signs of oxidative stress in the samples.

---

quote:

---

What's more, the sperm of men who'd been infected were roughly three times as slow, and their sperm counts were far lower as well.

"These effects on sperm cells are associated with lower sperm quality and reduced fertility potential," says lead researcher Behzad Hajizadeh Maleki, a sports scientist from Justus-Liebig-University.

"Although these effects tended to improve over time, they remained significantly and abnormally higher in the COVID-19 patients, and the magnitude of these changes were also related to disease severity."

---