Skip to main content * * [cnn]Health * ┌───────┬──────┬────────────┬──────┬───────────┬──────────┬─────────────┬──────────┬───────────┐ │ CNN │ CNN │[Languages ]│On CNN│Transcripts│ Headline │ CNN │ About │Preferences│ │Europe │ Asia │ │ TV │ │ News │International│ CNN.com │ │ └───────┴──────┴────────────┴──────┴───────────┴──────────┴─────────────┴──────────┴───────────┘ * * SEARCH CNN.COM: * Study: Sperm quality differs among U.S. regions [advertisement] [ ] [GO] [1] Men in urban areas found to be more fertile Home Page [1] World Men in urban areas found U.S. * to be more fertile * Weather * Business at ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ * CNN/Money Story Tools Sports at * SI.com ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ Click Here Politics Law ST. LOUIS, Missouri (AP) -- A study has found the quality of Technology semen significantly poorer in men from rural mid-Missouri than Science & in males from urban areas, and its authors believe agricultural Space chemicals might explain the difference. Health Entertainment The University of Missouri researchers said their study offered Travel the first convincing evidence that semen quality -- measured by Education the count, shape and movement of sperm -- varies significantly Special among regions of the United States. Reports Click Here The study appeared in Monday's online edition of Environmental SERVICES Health Perspectives, a publication of the National Institute of Video Environmental Health Sciences. Newswatch E-Mail Fertile men from mid-Missouri's Boone County were found to have Services a mean sperm count of about 59 million per milliliter, compared CNN To Go to 103 million for men in New York, 99 million in Minnesota and SEARCH CNN.COM: 81 million in Los Angeles. The sperm of the Boone County men also tended to be less vigorous, the study found. [ ] [GO] Dr. Shanna Swan of the University of Missouri-Columbia, the lead researcher, said she and her collaborators believe that environmental factors such as the use of agricultural chemicals might contribute to the differences. Farms make up more than half of Boone County, and most use chemical fertilizers, herbicides or pesticides. In contrast, 0 to 19 percent of the urban areas studied were devoted to farming. The researchers studied 512 couples receiving prenatal care at clinics in Columbia, Minneapolis, Los Angeles and New York as part of an ongoing Study for Future Families funded by the National Institutes of Health. Swan said previous studies of semen quality were conducted in large cities, except for a study in Iowa City, Iowa, that also found lower sperm concentration. Researchers still do not know why semen quality varies geographically, but are testing their hypothesis that exposure to agricultural chemicals through contaminated air or water plays a role. The study was conducted in collaboration with researchers at the University of Minnesota, the University of California at Los Angeles Medical Center, the University of California, Davis, and Mount Sinai School of Medicine. ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ Copyright 2002 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed. ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ Story Tools ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ Top Stories * Top Stories [1] [1] [1] [1] A little wine may [tz] Malvo talks; will [tz] keep mind sharp it count? Agency warns of cannabis Prince Charles' staff is health risks reeling from an allegation Lower sperm count in of rape by a staff member country than city and a coverup by the royal Gates gives $100M to fight family. AIDS in India Death toll at 36 in U.S. tornadoes Israeli officials say kibbutz shooting a turning point * SEARCH * * CNN.COM: [ ] [] ● * [1] (C) 2002 Cable News Network LP, LLLP. All external sites will open in a new An AOL Time Warner Company. All Rights external browser. Reserved. link CNN.com does not endorse external Terms under which this service is sites. provided to you. Read our privacy guidelines. Contact us. *