Infertility and Miscarriage

More than 2 million American and European couples who want to have children are unable to do so. Toxic chemicals are suspected in these cases as well.

In fact, the Council on Environmental Quality’s report on chemical hazards to human reproduction concluded that, “the relationship between exposure to chemicals and human reproductive impairment may be an important area of public health concern that deserves more scientific investigation.”

Perhaps you or someone close to you is living with this heartache. It may surprise you to learn that between 1938 and 1991 the sperm count of males in industrialized countries has decreased 50% in quantity and quality. A cross-sectional study of men found that 25% were sterile. Projected figures place the male sterility rate at over 50% early in this century.

Women’s fertility has also been negatively affected by the increased use of chemicals. In 1934, only twenty-one cases of endometriosis existed in the entire world. Now there are over 5 million women with this condition, which causes infertility, in the United States and Europe alone. High levels of toxins have been found in German women with endometriosis. Female monkeys exposed to dioxins had an increased rate of this condition also. Combine the decreased sperm count with the prevalence of endometriosis and you can see just how the infertility rate could grow so large and affect so many.

Even women who can conceive are experiencing extremely high rates of miscarriage. In 1988, more than 600,000 women experienced a miscarriage, and in most cases the cause was unclear. In many cases a woman’s body will reject an unborn baby if it detects a profound defect of some kind. We may begin wondering if we are living in a time when more babies have defects. Or perhaps the chemicals that enter the body somehow send mixed or wrong messages.

Many chemicals, including alkylphenol, found in many industrial and household detergents, are known hormone disrupters. This means they act like hormones and can actually change behaviour, mood, development and any other bodily functions regulated by hormones. It concerns me that the delicate balance of chemicals our bodies naturally produce and need to function properly can be skewed by synthetic, toxic chemicals.

Chemicals can also cause defects by damaging the egg cells in women. All the eggs a woman will ever have are produced while she is still a baby in the womb. By the fifth month of foetal life, the 3 to 4 million eggs a woman is born with have localized in her ovaries. Chemical exposure at any point can destroy or damage these cells, leaving her infertile or prone to birth defects or miscarriage. Once damage has occurred, repair is almost impossible.

In men, exposure to chemicals can affect sperm development profoundly. A study of male Vietnam veterans found they were 70% more likely to have a child with a birth defect due to chemical exposure. Many of the same chemicals are now found in products used every day around the home.

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