Nearly half of IVF cycles in the UK are linked to male fertility problems, statistics suggest

A generation of men are refusing to grow up and have children until it may be too late, fertility experts warn.

Nearly half of IVF cycles in the UK are linked to male fertility problems, statistics suggest.

And specialists say women have been blamed for dwindling fertility for too long – with men putting off fatherhood, unaware their ticking biological clock will slash their chances of children.

A team at Yale Fertility Centre in the US is studying the extent to which paternal age affects IVF outcomes, with results due to be presented later this month at the American Society for Reproductive Medicine congress in Salt Lake City.

Some 49 per cent of IVF cycles carried out in Britain in 2014 were due to ‘male factors’ – up from 31 per cent in 2010, according to the latest records from the Human Fertilisation and Embryology Authority.

Experts last night said that in clinics they found four to five in every ten couples needed help because of male fertility problems.

Specialists say the main reason is that sperm counts and sperm quality decline with age.

Studies show women with older partners take longer to conceive and are more likely to miscarry, with their children at greater risk of birth defects.

Yet older fathers are celebrated, such as Rolling Stone Ronnie Wood who became a father again this year aged 68. Professor Allan Pacey, a male fertility expert at Sheffield University, said: ‘Older mothers are lambasted, but for a man of the age of Ronnie Wood, we hand round the cigars, slap him on the back and say, “There’s life in the old dog yet.” It is something deep-rooted in society.’

A team at Yale Fertility Centre in the US is studying the extent to which paternal age affects IVF outcomes

Yet younger men are not interested in settling down, experts warn. Kevin McEleny, a consultant urologist in Newcastle who specialises in male fertility, said: ‘Generally men assume fertility is a female problem – they don’t want to talk about it, and if there is a problem, they do not want to engage with counselling. Women say to us that their men have a problem of “kidulthood”.

‘The woman may want to have a children, but they may not be able to find a male partner who is ready. The woman is ready, but the man wants to put it off and put it off.

‘And she comes to us and says, “The man I’m with still wants to play with his PlayStation.”’

Although men do not see the same dramatic fertility drop-off as women in their late 30s and early 40s, they still have a marked decline. Professor Pacey said: ‘Men over the age of 40 are half as fertile as men under the age of 25.

‘There is also a big jump in miscarriages after male age of 40, and an increased risk to child health.’ The average age of fathers was 33.1 in 2014, nearly four years older than four decades earlier, according to the Office for National Statistics.

AT 28, I WASN'T KEEN ON FATHERHOOD Collin Humphrey with his daughter Mae Collin Humphrey is a proud dad. Five-year-old Mae is the centre of his world, the reason to go to work every day and rush home each evening. ‘There is nothing like the love you get from a child – the way they you respond to you is incredible, they give you so much back,’ said Mr Humphrey, 38, from Newcastle. But ten years ago he was not so keen on fatherhood. ‘My wife Rhona and I had decided to start a family, but it turned out not to be so easy.’ When tests showed Mrs Humphrey, a nurse, who is now 36, had no fertility problems, doctors turned their attention to her husband. Mr Humphrey, a very keen cyclist who works for a financial services firm, had varicoceles - enlarged veins in the scrotum - which would require an operation. He also had an extremely low sperm count, which meant he would need a second operation to extract sperm from his testicles. At the time, in his late-20s, all Mr Humphrey’s focus was on his cycling. ‘I was cycling ten to 15 hours a week, with an eye to maybe turning professional,’ he said. ‘I didn’t want to be out of training for weeks and weeks for an operation, especially as it might not work. ‘I was a typical male saying, “there’s nothing wrong with me”. I just wanted to put it all off.’ Mr Humphrey’s marriage nearly fell apart as his wife tried to persuade him to undergo the procedures. ‘I had nobody to talk to about it, my mates would have just laughed about it.’ Eventually, his doctor, urologist Kevin McEleny at Newcastle Fertility Centre, intervened. ‘I was used to all these female nurses, but at last here was this bloke who could look me in the eye and tell me how it was,’ Mr Humphrey said. ‘He told me I was going to chuck it all away – my marriage, my chance of being a father, everything.’ After the two operations, and two rounds of IVF, Mae was finally born five years ago. And her father has not looked back. ‘Mae is the star of the show,’ he said. Advertisement

Some 15 per cent of children born in England and Wales in 2014 had a father aged 40-plus.

The age of mothers has increased at almost exactly the same rate – they had an average age of 30.2 in 2014, and 26.4 in 1974.

Professor Pacey said: ‘Everyone bashes women for waiting too long, but the increase in male age has completely paralleled it. There is a huge focus on female fertility, but women cannot do it by themselves.’

He said men were as much to blame for wanting to hold off, adding: ‘There is always another holiday to go on, another step on the career ladder to take, and men underestimate the impact that age can have. Men are not good at talking about it, there is a big taboo around it.’

Professor Adam Balen, of the British Fertility Society, said: ‘Young men may not be committing in perhaps the same way they were in the past. They need to be better informed – they need to realise that fertility is not just a female issue.’

Some scientists think sperm quality and sperm count for the average man have fallen over the past few decades, irrespective of age.

Advice for improving fertility includes cutting down on drinking and eating more healthily.

Specialists even say that stopping wearing tight underwear and sleeping nude can lower levels of damaged sperm by 25 per cent.

But not all experts are convinced, with many arguing labs are simply better at examining sperm now.

For men with low sperm counts or slow-moving sperm, treatment can help. That involves selecting the best sperm, injecting it into an egg, and then starting a cycle of IVF.