WHO reveals how smoking affects the ability of men and women to have children
Smoking, in all likelihood, reduces the chances of becoming pregnant — the risk of infertility in women who smoke is 40% higher than in nonsmokers.
"We urge everyone who is planning a pregnancy to quit smoking and improve their health, including reproductive health," the UN News Service quotes Kerstin Schotte, an officer with the World Health Organization (WHO) Tobacco Control Initiative.
The WHO defines infertility as the inability to achieve pregnancy after 12 months of regular sexual relations without the use of contraceptives — one in six people on the planet faces this problem.
In its new report, the WHO summarizes decades of collected evidence on the link between tobacco use and infertility in women, as well as the negative effect of tobacco on sperm quality and sexual function in men. The WHO also notes that secondhand smoke can affect fertility as well, meaning that nonsmokers may also fall into the risk group.
The authors of the report urge women who smoke to give up the harmful habit, emphasizing that those who quit smoking have a 25% lower risk of infertility than those who have not done so.
Smoking can also reduce the chances of success in infertility treatment. Earlier, the results of 21 studies had already pointed to a link between cigarette smoking and a lower number of live births, including after assisted reproductive technologies such as in vitro fertilization. The data also indicate that smoking can reduce the likelihood of a successful outcome by roughly half.
It is emphasized that this concerns not only women. A review of 44 studies involving more than 60,000 men showed that smoking is associated with reproductive function disorders, including sperm abnormalities and sexual dysfunction. The data showed that men who smoke more often suffered from erectile dysfunction, problems with ejaculation and sperm quality, including the absence of sperm cells, their poor motility and abnormal shape.
It is noted that although data on the harm of electronic cigarettes (also known as vapes), hookahs, smokeless tobacco and other new products are still taking shape, the WHO warns that they may also pose a risk to reproductive health and that this issue requires further research.
The WHO publication recommends that medical workers discuss the reproductive risks of tobacco use with individuals and couples planning a pregnancy.
Specialists also call for helping smokers get rid of this habit with the help of methods that have proven their effectiveness.
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