Source: wnd.com
A new Harvard study suggests men who eat higher amounts of soy-based foods become “feminized” – confirming a series of reports documented by longtime WND columnist Jim Rutz and drawing outraged protests from the soy food industry.
According to a report from Reuters, the study was done by Jorge Chavarro of the Harvard School of Public Health in Boston, whose work appeared in the journal Human Reproduction.
It reportedly is the largest study of humans to look at the relationship between semen quality and a plant form of the female sex hormone estrogen known as phytoestrogen, which is plentiful in soy-rich foods.
“What we found was men that consume the highest amounts of soy foods in this study had a lower sperm concentration compared to those who did not consume soy foods,” Chavarro told Reuters.
“It was a relatively large difference,” he said.
The researcher said animal studies already have linked eating the plant-derived estrogens called isoflavones with infertility, but that’s not evident in humans yet.
The researchers looked at 99 men who went to a fertility clinic between 2000 and 2006, and their intake of soy-based foods, including tofu, tempeh, soy sausages, bacon or burgers, soy milk, cheese and yogurt.
Chavarro reported men in the highest intake category had 41 million sperm-per-milliliter fewer than men who ate no soy foods, prompting him to suggest soy has a “deleterious effect” on the reproductive system.
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