Men are being warned to keep sexually shipshape so they have enough able semen to start a family.
Fertility specialist Dr Victoria Walker says blokes wanting to be dads need to keep their sperm healthy and give them more swimming lessons.
And that means having more sex and not exposing them to harmful toxins from bad habits.
Her warning comes as the NHS claims men are the problem in one in three couples struggling to get pregnant.
A growing male fertility crisis has seen the average sperm count dive by 52 per cent in the past four decades.
Dr Walker, 47, said: “Since the Fifties experts have noticed a decline in sperm quality, but haven’t been able to work out why. If it gets to a point where everyone’s sperm is rubbish we’ll see fewer births.”
Here the mum of three, a leading expert at internationally renowned fertility clinic Institut Marques, shares her top tips for keeping your sperm in Michael Phelps shape.
HAVE MORE SEX
Men are making sperm all the time and they reabsorb them if they do not use them.
Dr Walker says: “So if a man doesn’t ejaculate, the sperm just sits in the testes and is slowly re-absorbed. If you ejaculate regularly, you get rid of the stores. It perks everything up and helps you make more.”
QUIT SMOKING
Giving up the cigs will not only be better for your health, as every doctor will tell you, but it also helps you man up on the reproductive front.
The toxins in cigarette smoke go everywhere in your body, like your lungs and your arteries, but it can also affect how your sperm is created.
Stopping smoking will improve the quality of your little fellas.
TAKE MULTIVITAMINS
When women try to get pregnant, they take vitamins to help improve their egg quality. And during pregnancy they take things like folic acid to help make a healthy baby.
There are similar things men can do too – like making sure they get plenty of the vitamins and micronutrients helpful for sperm production.
These include vitamin C, D, E and the likes of magnesium, zinc and selenium which can all be obtained by eating healthily as well as in supplement form. They all help with sperm formation. Start seeing to this early – it takes sperm at least 70 days to grow.
QUIT JUNK FOOD
The same goes for your sperm as it does for you – eating a lot of rubbish food is not good for you, but lots of fruit and vegetables is excellent for your health.
Fruit and vegetables contain lots of natural antioxidants, vitamins and zinc that all helps with the formation of healthy sperm.
So a healthy lifestyle is all part and parcel of sound fertility.
CUT OUT BOOZE
Some people say as little as two drinks can affect the quality of your sperm.
And that is on top of the fact that if you drink too much you struggle to get erections, or it makes it more difficult.
If you regularly drink large amounts it reduces the quality of your sperm as well as making it harder to perform.
LOSE WEIGHT
Fat can store toxins from the environment that can damage your sperm.
If you’re very overweight you might carry the nasties that come from the likes of pollutants and pesticides.
These toxins might be something in our food, the pesticides that are going on the fields, or the plastic that surrounds us.
They get into the atmosphere, into what we eat, and go up
the food chain into our bodies – and that’s feeding back into poorer fertility.
Try to be your true weight according to your height for the best results.
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