Consistent Declining Male Potency: Chair and Dress do matter?

A substantial amount of research works available to show a decline in the male potency and a layman account is provided by the Indian Express (1), some 7 years back. Keep all technical details asides, even in your routine life, you would be one or other ways facing this crisis among your near and dears. However, in the present discussion, I will be confined to only a couple of reasons to deal with the problem, which is declining in quality and quantity of sperms. The first one is our sitting habits and our attires.

To explain this one has to understand the fundamentals of the male reproductive system (2). However, for the present purpose, I will dive the details of only 2 organs here i.e.  Scrotum and Testicles. The organs of the male reproductive system are specialized for the following functions:

• To produce, maintain and transport sperm (the male reproductive cells) and protective fluid (semen)
• To discharge sperm within the female reproductive tract
• To produce and secrete male sex hormones

Scrotum

The scrotum is the loose pouch-like sac of skin that hangs behind the penis. It contains the testicles (also called testes), as well as many nerves and blood vessels. The scrotum has a protective function and acts as a climate control system for the testes. For normal sperm development, the testes must be at a temperature slightly cooler than the body temperature. Special muscles in the wall of the scrotum allow it to contract (tighten) and relax, moving the testicles closer to the body for warmth and protection or farther away from the body to cool the temperature.

 

Testicles (testes)

The testes are oval organs about the size of very large olives that lie in the scrotum, secured at either end by a structure called the spermatic cord. Most men have two testes. The testes are responsible for making testosterone, the primary male sex hormone, and for producing sperm. Within the testes are coiled masses of tubes called seminiferous tubules. These tubules are responsible for producing sperm cells through a process called spermatogenesis.

Reproduction Capability and Sperm Count and Quality

The World Health Organization says a man with a semen count of 15 million and more can reproduce. In India, however, some diagnostic labs still consider 20 million as the lower cutoff for infertility.

To tackle this problem, the WHO has begun conducting workshops in different Indian cities, where embryologists are given short-term training on the latest guidelines about minimum sperm count required for reproduction and the scales of measurement for the quality of male reproductive cells.

“WHO’s the latest guideline on semen analysis is more evidence-based and reflects the fertility potential of males more accurately. These clearly show that minimum sperm concentration required for reproduction is 15 million sperm/ ml,” said WHO expert Daniel Franken in Delhi on Feb 13, 2013 (TOI).  However, as sperm quality and quantity fall, an epidemic confronts Indian men, A French study that reported in Dec 2012 a 32% drop in average sperm count globally has shaken the medical world (IE).

Facts to Support the Decline

The British Medical Journal published its landmark, comprehensive 1992 study that indicated “a genuine decline in semen quality over the past 50 years,” and scientists began hypothesizing about potential causes (3). Semen parameters in Indian men have declined with time and the deterioration is quantitatively higher in the infertile group. A study conducted in 2018, also provides reference values for semen parameters in Indian men (4).  In a study conducted some 2 decades back shown a significant decrease (P < 0.05) in sperm count (43%) and a departure from normal sperm morphology (30%) over a period of time. In the fertile group as well, there is a similar reduction in sperm count and sperm morphology. The percent of all men in the category of > 100 million/ml sperm count decreased with a concomitant increase in the < 20 million/ml group. The preliminary analysis indicates a decline in semen quality in our group of men over a decade (5), , while in the past decade also a report also showed a similar pattern (6). 

The issue of declining semen quality got global attention in 1992 when a meta-analysis by Carlsen et al., revealed that the mean sperm concentration had fallen from 113 to 66 million/ml (almost 50%) in the past 50 years between 1938 and 1990 (7) . Subsequently, andrologists and clinicians all around the world conducted many retrospective and prospective studies to investigate such changes in the male population of their respective regions and many of them found a conceivable downward trend in various semen parameters (8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22)

What could be the Possible Reason for Decline

There are several reasons have given to decline in the quality and quantity of sperms, which mainly includes infection, obesity, alcohol, smoking laptop, and of course age. As per WINFERTILITY, there are mainly 7 reasons to explain, why this decline is and that includes diabetes, drug use, Hot Tubs, and Saunas and Boxers vs. Briefs in addition to the aforesaid reasons. ToKnow More

 Why We See Sitting Habit and Attire in India?

For the present discussion, I am interested in the last two reasons only. A man’s testicles need to stay cooler than the rest of his body in order to manufacture sperm. That’s why they hang outside in the scrotum instead of being inside his body cavity. When he gets hot in a hot tub, Jacuzzi or sauna, his sperm count goes down. If he’ll stay out of the hot tub for a few weeks, it will usually bounce back, winfertility again says, but really? No comment for now, but you can understand. Nevertheless, wearing Boxers and Briefs are affixing it close to your thighs, which is undesirable.

Temperature affects the Sperm Production

A large case-control study found that men exposed to heat because of their occupation were 1.8 times more likely to have morphologically abnormal sperm. They were also 1.8 times more likely to have been trying unsuccessfully to conceive for more than one year, than men who had not been occupationally exposed to heat (23).

Now if you sit on a chair, wearing jeans or even pants, again keep it close to the legs and then the temperature of the scrotum comes close to the body temperature, which nullifies the purpose of nature to put it outside of the body. Just think, the ancient Indian traditional style of sitting, Sukhasana or Padmasana, during which the scrotum hangs away from the thighs, provides good aeration and temperature exchange with ambient temperature.

Secondly, see the Indian male attire from loose Pheran in Jammu and Kashmir, followed by Dhoti in the Gangetic plain, to lungi in south India, as we move from north to south of India. One can clearly see the climatic conditions have closely followed in their attires. As the climate is becoming warmer, complete support to assure proper aeration and acclimatization of the scrotum have taken care of.  Remember the person who had intended not to go for sexual affairs, and claim themselves ‘Infirmary’, use to wear, langotes (Diapers).

So, what can you do?

As you can’t go back in life, similarly you can’t change the present system, your job profession, or the option provided to you. So you have to think otherwise, in such a way, it can provide proper aeration and cooling activity to your scrotum. Think to change your undergarments. Though it seems a bit funny no way out that goes back to traditional style. Use loose pants (trousers), avoid the use of jeans particularly. Remember, the later originated in colder regions of the globe.