Beef during pregnancy ‘produces low sperm count’
March 28th, 2007 by 
Eric
The sons of mothers who eat beef frequently during pregnancy have been found to have lower sperm counts than those of mothers consuming less beef, a study from the US has found.
The study, published in the Human Reproduction journal, discovered that 18 per cent of the men whose mothers had eaten the most beef of those surveyed had sperm counts classed as ’sub-fertile’.
Just five per cent of the offspring of mothers who ate less beef had sperm counts in this category.
No connection was found to exist between the men themselves eating beef and the quality of their sperm. Nor were links made between the mothers’ intake of other meat products, reports Medical News Today.
The tests were conducted on men born between 1949 and 1983 since it was at this time in the US that mothers would have had difficulty avoiding beef containing chemical additives and hormones.
The researchers have suggested the same experiment be carried out on men living in countries where hormones are no longer permitted in cattle rearing. This would help determine what it is about beef that has affected sperm count among men.
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