Part One
When couples encounter challenges starting a family, the reproductive health of the woman is usually called into question first.
But since the spread of the coronavirus, the question of sperm health has become topical – though the virus has since been debunked as a contributor to male infertility.
In fact men's part in infertility has been under the microscope for much longer.
Dr Catherine Minto-Bain of the TT IVF and Fertility Centre said evidence gathered over the past 20 years shows male infertility in Trinidad and Tobago accounts for more than half the number of cases of couples assessed as needing assistance in conceiving.
Minto-Bain said, "It's different in different countries across the globe. In the UK the statistics show that it is probably 30 per cent women and 30 per cent men, another ten per cent is unexplained and the rest is as a result of mixed causes.
"So we did some research here in the last couple of years to have a good look to see what is going on in TT."
She said research findings in the UK differ from those in TT.
When she first came from the UK to practise in TT over 15 years ago she thought, "Wow, I have never seen so many sperm problems. Maybe we are encountering some of the most challenging cases, or maybe this is just an unusual period."
But she said science director and embryologist Natalie Jess, who came to practise in TT from Australia, made the same observation, adding that there are similar cases in other Caribbean territories, such as Jamaica.
[caption id="attachment_901837" align="alignnone" width="684"] Lead clinician and medical director of TT IVF & Fertility Centre Dr Catherine Minto-Bain -[/caption]
Asked about the ideal research approach, Minto-Bain said it would require a wide, random sample of men from a range of backgrounds. But that would be challenging to complete, because the process of sample-gathering would require volunteers being willing to participate in a process that generally has proven uncomfortable for most men.
What the team at the centre has done instead is take random samples for analysis from over 10,000 people they've seen. From the analysis, they found most of the challenges experienced by couples came from the men.
"This comes up in about 60 per cent of the couples we see. Whether that is reflective of what is happening in the general population is another thing, but we have been doing this for over 20 years and this is what we have seen over the past ten years."
Asked what might be some of the causes for male infertility, which is, of course, linked to sperm health, Minto-Bain said there are several reasons such as genetics.
Sperm researchers around the world have concluded that genetics account for 80 per cent of sperm defects. A large number of issues with sperm health are also linked to unhealthy lifestyle practices and toxic living environments.
Diet affects what flows through the bloodstream, inevitably affecting the quality of sperm. So a man can have perfectly good sperm count, but if his lifestyle
