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I once worked as a psychiatric technician on a children’s mental health crisis unit. I worked with children aged seven to twelve who had been molested, abused and generally disenfranchised from childhood. I had nightmares about their screams and tears. The experience made me stop and think about the arbitrary ability to breed. Many of the children I worked with seemed to come from people who were completely unfit to parent, who maybe didn’t even want to parent. At the same time, I watched as family members and friends who were respectable citizens and loving people, struggled to become pregnant.

It seemed so unfair. It is unfair and the story is becoming all too familiar. Men and women unable to conceive. It should be compellingly disconcerting to us as a species that the average sperm count is half of what it was in 1930; that 1.2 million women reported fertility problems in 2002 (a nearly 50% increase in just twenty years); and that miscarriages, still births and birth defects are all increasing.

According to Reproductive Roulette, a new report from the Center for American Progress,

Reproductive health in the United States is headed in the wrong direction on a host of indicators. Fertility problems, miscarriages, preterm births, and birth defects are all up. These trends are not simply the result of women postponing motherhood. In fact, women under 25 and women between 25 and 34 reported an increasing number of fertility problems over the last several decades. Nor are reproductive health problems limited to women. Average sperm count appears to be steadily declining, and there are rising rates of male genital birth defects such as hypospadias, a condition in which the urethra does not develop properly…

As reproductive health has declined, chemical production has increased dramatically. The number of chemicals registered for commercial use now stands at 80,000—a 30 percent increase since 1979. Americans are exposed to these chemicals in a variety of ways, including through industrial releases, contaminated food, household products and cosmetics, and workplaces where chemicals are used. Tests of blood and urine confirm rising and widespread exposure to a chemical soup of metals, pesticides, plasticizers, and other substances, many of which are dangerous to reproductive health…

We are seriously compromising our ability to reproduce. For individuals, it can be a harrowing, emotional experience. For a species, it’s terribly unwise. Some scientists predict we are headed for “reproductive intensive care” or worse, human extinction, if we continue down this path.

Learn more by visiting:

Reproductive Health Technologies Project
Our Stolen Future
The Collaborative on Health and the Environment

Watch a documentary:

The Disappearing Male

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