The reproductive system of the human
male is also highly inefficient. Most male animals produce 25 million
sperms per day per gram of testicular tissue. Humans produce only four
million sperms. Only the gorilla, the cheetah and the goose produce less
sperm per gram and testicular tissue than us!
To illustrate the importance of sperm
per gram of testicular tissue, the average bull ejaculates about 10
billion sperms, whereas the average fertile man ejaculation would
contain between 1-5 billion sperms. This means that the average bull in a
single ejaculation produces 30-100 times more than that of the average
man.
Continue after the cut....
Continue after the cut....
The bull sperm will also move three
times the speed of the human sperm in a perfectly straight line, with
virtually no abnormal, weak or deformed sperms. A man whose ejaculation
has 60 per cent of the sperm moving is lucky. Studies on sperm
population find that up to 40 per cent of a man’s sperm are abnormal.
Take the pig as an example to really
show superior fertility! The pig ejaculates an entire pint of sperm on
having sex with the sow. Its orgasm will take a full half hour. Compare
this to a mere 120 seconds (two minutes) for most men.
In addition, the pig has little screws
like grooves on the end of its penis that fit into a similar groove in
the cervix of the female. This guarantees that no sperm will leak during
intercourse. The amount of sperm in a single pig’s ejaculation is about
400 times higher than the amount of sperm in a single human’s
ejaculation, and none is lost.
In most animals, the sperm cells, as
they mature from stage to stage, are arranged in perfect order. This is
not so in humans whose sperm cells mature in a helter-skelter fashion,
according to histologists.
Why is the human sperm count so poor?
Several factors have been blamed for the low sperm count in men. They are as follow:
Stress: It has been
well documented that modern life can have a negative impact on
reproduction. Many sperm banks in Europe, America and here in Lagos get
medical students or other professional students to donate their sperms.
It is not unusual for good donors with high sperm counts on one occasion
to have a poor sperm count on the next occasion if the donor is having
an exam.
There was a case in the University of
California where a donor’s sperm count went literally to zero. It was
only a close interview that revealed that this student was going through
a bout of depression, thinking that his life was falling apart. There
are cases of infertility with low sperm count from the husband. When the
couple goes on vacation, the wife gets pregnant because of the change
in the environment, which removes the male stress factor.
Hazardous substances: There are several
factors in the environment that have a terrible effect on the sperm. To
make the situation worse, many of these substances have not been
thoroughly documented, researched or accounted for.
In a village in China, for instance, in
the early 1920s they discovered that fertility was on the decline and
the women were not getting pregnant. Suddenly in the 1930s, the
sterility was reversed and the people started having children again. The
villagers thought that the curse placed on them had been lifted. It was
later they realised that the sterility was due to change in cooking
oil.
The use of cheap, crude, cottonseed oil
for cooking created the sterility in men. It was found that the crude
extract had chemical called gossypols that caused male sterility and has
now been used as a male contraceptive. A good number of these have been
discovered by accident, while there are several out there that are yet
to be discovered.
There are possibly many herbs or fruits
that contain gossypol-like substances that the Nigerian population eats
and we do not know about. A lot of food intolerances have been found to
lead to intestinal auto-intoxification that ends up with toxins in the
testis. The same goes for food containing heavy metals.
Sexually-transmitted diseases:
Research shows that about 10 percent of human infertility is caused by
tubule obstruction, and this is usually, although not always, caused by
infectious diseases transmitted sexually. One third of African men are
sterile because of epididymal obstruction caused by sexually transmitted
diseases.
For example, gonorrhea causes
irreversible tubule blockage. This type of infertility caused by
sexually transmitted diseases requires the most complex medical
treatment, which includes new methods of assisted conception or
reproductive technology.
Human destiny and fertility:
25 per cent of infertility are partly due to some of the reasons given
above. The remaining couples suffering from infertility that cannot be
explained need not be pessimistic. The new infertility technologies of
IVF, GIFT, ICSI, micro surgery with TESA, and most recently,
pre-implantation genetic diagnosis, can help most if not all infertile
couples conceive.
The new technology in conception
This refers to the process of solving
seemingly impossible or difficult infertility problems with new
technology. Such technology usually involves the complex handling of
human gametes consisting of the sperm and egg in order to achieve
conception and subsequent pregnancy, leading to the delivery of a
healthy baby.
In the United States of America, after
the initial errors in California in which gametes were improperly
handled, resulting in a black couple giving birth to a white baby while a
white couple gave birth to a black baby, mandatory training and
examination were required before someone could be appointed the director
of an IVF programme or laboratory. They must be licensed by examination
as High Complexity Clinical Laboratory Director (HCLD) by the American
Board of Bio-Analysis. These individuals have helped in maintaining the
practice of Assisted Reproductive Technology (ART) in USA.
•To be concluded
-Oladapo Ashiru
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