Study: Covid-19 could damage quality of sperm, reduce fertility in men
By: Team Ifairer | Posted: 30-01-2021
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The more severe the disease, the bigger the changes, he added. The male reproductive system "should be considered a vulnerable route of COVID-19 infection and declared a high-risk organ by the World Health Organisation," Maleki said. Experts not involved in the study welcomed the research, but cautioned that more was needed before drawing hard and fast conclusions.
"Men should not be unduly alarmed," noted Alison Campbell, director of embryology of the CARE Fertility Group in Britain. "There is currently no definitive evidence of long-lasting damage caused by COVID-19 , to sperm or male reproductive potential," she told the London-based Science Media Centre.
The results could have been skewed, she added, by the fact that men recovering from Covid were treated with corticosteroids and antiviral therapies, while the control group was not. Allan Pacey, a specialist in male reproductive medicine at the University of Sheffield, raised a "stong note of caution" on how the data was interpreted.
Some of the indicators of decreased sperm quality could be due to factors besides COVID-19 , he said, noting that more men in the COVID-19 group were overweight. The simple fact that only one group was very sick - no matter the cause - also needed to be taken into account, he added.
Source: www.firstpost.com