A study published in the journal Human Reproduction suggests that there is a link between the number of sperm expelled during an ejaculation and the life expectancy of men. Danish researchers have analyzed sperm of more than 78,000 men. The samples were taken between 1965 and 2015 in a public laboratory in Copenhagen. The researchers also had access to the participants’ medical records throughout this period.
Almost 3 years of life in addition for men with very concentrated sperm in sperm
The conclusions of this work reveal that men whose sperm contained more than 120 million mobile sperm lived on average almost 3 more years (2.7 years) that men whose sperm contained between 0 and 5 million mobile sperm.
The researcher and epidemiologist of reproduction, Laerke Priskorn, who is also co-author of the study, recalls that previous studies had demonstrated a similar link. However, these works, which are the first to base themselves on data collected over a long period, make it possible to confirm “that there is an obvious association between the number of sperm and the life expectancy of men who participated in the study“, She notes. The researchers report, moreover, that the” precocious “deaths observed in men with a sperm of less good quality,” do not only be explained by socio-economic factors or pre-existing diseases.
Sperm, a reflection of overall health?
According to the authors of this study, these results may lead to considering the quality of sperm as an indicator of a man’s overall health. Sperm analysis could, in the future, make it possible to detect health problems other than infertility. “”We cannot yet explain this link observed between the quality of the sperm of a man and his global state of health. However, this study suggests that it is possible to identify sub-groups of men with a quality of altered sperm and which are a priori healthy when their sperm is analyzed, but which are more at risk of developing certain diseases in the coming years “comments Dr. Jørgensen, co-author of the study.
A study to be taken with tweezers
Even if this unprecedented study covers a large sample of participants who have been followed for 50 years, it has limits. The researchers indicate that they had no information on the behavior of the health cohort. In addition, the health data collected were limited to diagnoses from the National Patient Register (Danish National Registers), and they only concerned men’s subpopulation.