Air Pollution and Fertility

In last week’s newsletter I talked about the relationship
Between Particulate Air Pollution (smog) and Alzheimer’s disease.

I discussed the importance for city dwellers, which is most of my patients and readers, to get and use an air filter in their house and certainly at least in their bedroom when they are sleeping.

Now new information is coming out increasingly, to show the relationship between air pollution and infertility. It is currently estimated by the CDC that 6.7 million women have impaired ability to get pregnant or to carry a baby to term. This represents 10.9% of women between the ages of 15 and 44.

Now air pollution is getting linked to infertility.

In men, air pollution has been linked to DNA damage, abnormal sperm morphology, and reduce sperm performance.

More and more studies are showing that exposure to environmental air pollutants affect reproductive functions and, in particular, produce adverse effects on pregnancy outcomes, fertility and fetal health.

“Epidemiological studies demonstrate that exposure to ambient levels of air pollutants are associated with low birth weight, intrauterine growth retardation, prematurity, neonatal death, and decreased fertility in males.”

In a very recent study it was shown that short-term decreases in a couple’s ability to conceive was associated with airborne particles of the size PM2.5 as well as nitrous oxide which is part of ordinary smog.

Another recent article from last month is showing that living in a city with air pollution lowers sperm quality and can affect fertility. The author of the article said that it “can take up to three months from being exposed to pollution until effects on the sperm are seen.”

Another recent article has shown a 2.6 fold increase in the risk of miscarriage from a brief exposure to high levels of ambient particulate matter, as in smog of a size smaller then PM10.

Putting all this information together has certainly helped me to understand why young couples are having so much trouble conceiving and carrying a baby to term. Increasingly we see miscarriages and and many other fertility problems in the young women of today.

All this information led a colleague of mine Walter Crinnion, ND, to say semi-jokingly to me “We can now recommend air filters in our patients’ houses as fertility aids!”

For this reason, I encourage all my patients and readers who are trying to conceive to purchase a high quality air filter, which will be under $1000, and use it nightly in your bedroom with the windows and doors closed while you sleep.

It just might help you have a baby!

See the next article on my Recommended Air Filters for your house.

References

Ambient air pollution exposure and damage to male gametes

Air pollution and effects on reproductive-system functions

Environmental factors and semen quality.

Short-term impact of atmospheric pollution on fecundability

Air pollution lowers sperm quality

Effects of exposure to high levels of particulate air
pollution during the follicular phase of the conception
cycle on pregnancy outcome in couples undergoing in
vitro fertilization and embryo transfer

Effects of exposure to high levels of particulate air pollution during the follicular phase of the conception cycle

What does PM2.5 and PM10 Mean?