Smoking during pregnancy can influence fertility of boys

03.10.2014

It is known that smoking during pregnancy is associated with certain risks to children's health, but about 20% of expectant mothers do not give up the habit in this period. In a new study, the results of which were published in the journal «Human Reproduction», scientists have shown that smoking during pregnancy or breast-feeding may impair fertility in boys. This, in turn, is another reason that at this time to give up the habit.

Australian scientists from the University of Newcastle point out that so far the effect of maternal smoking during pregnancy on ability of their sons' fertility in the future have not been studied in detail, but they are able to analyze a new experiment on animals. Despite the fact that this study included only study effects of cigarette smoke on animals during pregnancy and lactation, the researchers noted that results are also relevant to humans.

During the experiment, 27 female animals were exposed to cigarette smoke equivalent to smoking one cigarette pack (24 cigarettes) per day for a person, and other 27 females, in turn, received no such influence and formed the control group. Then, after 6 weeks, all of them were placed with males to produce offspring. The 1st group of female animals subsequently were exposed to cigarette smoke throughout pregnancy and lactation, as long as their progeny did not grown up. In the future, researchers analyzed the health of 108 male animals born from females who participated in the study. They studied DNA damage of cells involved in the production of sperm, size and shape of sperm, their level of activity, ability of males to reproduce.

As it turned out, in male animals born from females who were exposed to cigarette smoke during pregnancy and lactation, has decreased sperm count, level of activity, many of them had abnormal shape and could not fertilize the egg.

According to the scientists, the results show that when these animals reach maturity, they often can not reproduce, because they are subfertile or infertile. It enabled to prove that effect of cigarette smoke on pregnant entails damage to the health of the offspring in the future. Despite the fact that in this study, an experiment was conducted on animals, which only simulates the effects of the smoke on the human body, these results reinforce the hypothesis that smoking during pregnancy has a negative impact on male fertility in later life.

Based on: www.medicalnewstoday.com