The world is ill-prepared for the global crash in children being born which is set to have a "jaw-dropping" impact on societies, say researchers. Falling fertility rates mean nearly every country could have shrinking populations by the end of the century. And 23 nations - including Spain and Japan - are expected to see their populations halve by 2100. Countries will also age dramatically, with as many people turning 80 as there are being born.

It is theoretically possible that Covid-19 could be damaging to men’s reproductive health, according to an article published on the Hubei government’s website on Thursday, only to be removed a few hours later. Men who had contracted the disease and recovered from it should seek medical advice on whether it might have had a detrimental impact on their fertility, said the piece, which was produced by a team from the reproductive medicine centre at Tongji Hospital in Wuhan, the capital of Hubei.

Results suggest environmental factors could play a role in female reproductive health

The number of babies born in the U.S. last year fell to a 32-year low, deepening a fertility slump that is reshaping America’s future workforce. About 3.79 million babies were born in the U.S. in 2018, according to provisional data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s National Center for Health Statistics.

The homes we live in and the food we eat might contain chemicals that reduce male fertility - and that goes for both men and their dogs, new research suggests.

Oral use of cannabinoids could help manage pain and the urge to scratch in epidermolysis bullosa, according to a study that evaluated three case reports. 

Studies have repeatedly linked maternal smoking during pregnancy with reduced sperm counts in male offspring. Now a research team at Lund University in Sweden has discovered that, independently of nicotine exposure from the mother, men whose fathers smoked at the time of pregnancy had half as many sperm as those with non-smoking fathers.

Their report found fertility rate falls meant nearly half of countries were now facing a "baby bust" - meaning there are insufficient children to maintain their population size. The researchers said the findings were a "huge surprise", and there would be profound consequences for societies with "more grandparents than grandchildren". The study, published in the Lancet, followed trends in every country from 1950 to 2017.

Scientists have taken early steps towards developing an artificial ovary that could lead to improved fertility preservation treatments. The technique is aimed at helping women at risk of becoming infertile, such as those who receive chemotherapy. The Danish scientists removed parts of the ovary and altered them so they could potentially be transplanted later when the woman wants to conceive.

A WOMAN has claimed she was shocked to discover her real dad is her parents’ fertility doctor after taking an Ancestry.com DNA test. Kelli Rowlette, 36, reportedly took legal action against reproductive specialist Dr Gerald E Mortimer after he was revealed as her DNA match through the site.

Women have been told for years that if they don’t have children before their mid-30s, they may not be able to. But a new study from Princeton University’s Coleen Murphy has identified a drug that extends egg viability in worms, even when taken midway through the fertile window, which could theoretically extend women’s fertility by three to six years. Her work appears in the current issue of the journal Current Biology.

An ongoing case in Israel touches on a decades-old global debate. By Joseph Frankel.

We’ve all heard about the mile high club, but now an expert has claimed that we need to start thinking about sex much further away from Earth too. On a recent Atlantic Live panel, Assistant Professor Kris Lehnhardt, from George Washington University, described sex in space as a “real concern” and one that humans have not addressed to date.

Researchers at Northwestern University are celebrating the birth of several litters of baby mice that would be totally unremarkable had their mothers possessed ovaries. They did not. Instead, they were implanted with 3D-printed, gelatin-based bioprosthetic ovaries designed to ultimately restore fertility in human cancer survivors. The innovative, scalable ovaries allowed the mice to ovulate, to get pregnant, and to give birth. And the pups are all right.

Female hormones impact women’s assertiveness and sexual availability, according to a study recently published in Psychoneuroendocrinology. Previous studies of female sexual behavior have found that women are the fussier sex when it comes to mate selection. This is thought to be because women put in the greater parental investment due to pregnancy, giving birth, breast feeding and historically being the primary carer for the offspring, whilst the male took on a hunter-gatherer role. Therefore, females are more selective in choosing a high quality mate that compensates for their parental investment.

Imagine finding out your father wasn’t the man you thought he was. Imagine finding out he was your mother’s fertility doctor. By Alison Motluk.

This is the first baby to be born using a particular “3-parent-baby” technique to treat infertility. The girl was born on 5 January in a fertility clinic in Kiev, Ukraine. “With the help of this method, a 34-year-old woman who had suffered from infertility for more than 15 years gave birth to a healthy baby that’s genetically her own,” said a statement from the Nadiya clinic.

Infertile women have been offered new hope after scientists found that a common cancer drug triggers the development of new eggs, an outcome previously thought to be impossible. In a discovery hailed as “astonishing,” researchers at the University of Edinburgh proved that it is possible to reverse the clock and coax the ovaries back into a pre-pubescent state where they begin to produce new eggs.

A sperm donor billed as a genius turned out to be a convicted felon with serious mental health problems, according to lawsuits filed in B.C. Supreme Court. The man who donated sperm to two Vancouver families so that they could have children through artificial insemination was falsely characterized and improperly screened. The plaintiffs, who are identified only by initials, are suing Xytex Corp., an Atlanta-based sperm bank and Genesis Fertility Centre Inc. in Vancouver.

Despite the preponderance of think-pieces on the subject, few children are actually materializing through the egg freezing route. Is what’s being billed as the modern woman’s insurance policy actually a crock of bullshit? By Tracy Moore.