r/science • u/mvea Professor | Medicine • 10d ago

Health Ultra-processed foods harm men’s health. They increase weight, disrupt hormones, decrease testosterone, and introduce harmful substances linked to declining sperm quality. They contain industrial and synthetic ingredients. This may be why over the past 50 years, sperm quality has plummeted.

https://cbmr.ku.dk/news/2025/not-all-calories-are-equal-ultra-processed-foods-harm-mens-health/
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u/clyypzz 10d ago

This is most likely just one factor of the problem. Others might be a far more sedentary life and work, more pollution of new types such as endocrine disruptores like BPA, PFAS, lead, aluminium, and tons of other stuff plus social factors plus stress from a changing society and so on and so on

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u/jackloganoliver 10d ago edited 10d ago

Yeah. I think in general modernization happened faster than we have been able to adapt, whether to new chemical compounds and foods or just to new modes of doing something like feeding ourselves in general.

Within the past two hundred years, our lives have changed so much that our day to day behaviors look nothing like our ancestors' just two generations ago, let alone the last 5-6.

We live the lives of a different species really. One far more sedentary and more mentally/emotionally/socially taxed than in the past. It's no wonder our bodies fail to meet the demands.

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u/Tricky-Ad7897 10d ago

OTOH we're also living like 20-30 years longer so you win some and you lose some ig

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u/jackloganoliver 10d ago edited 10d ago

Well, living longer is also a part of what I'm talking about. People are having kids later, becoming grandparents later, and generally delaying several parts of becoming adults because, well, there's less rush. And retirement planning is one of those added new emotional stressors I mentioned. Previous generations didn't have to plan a retirement. They just moved in with their family and helped care for the next generation, which came along every decade and a half or so. Now generations are spacing out 25+ years among some populations. That's a huge difference.

But also, it feels worth pointing out that reducing infant mortality rates has been the key driver of increased life expectancy. Humans are making it to adulthood with much more consistency in most of the world. That's monumental for life expectancy.