Medicine: More Babies

One of the first-day speakers at last week's World Congress on Fertility and Sterility, which met in Manhattan, told the 1,300 assembled delegates that they ought to be worried about the amount of fertility in the world already. He was Conservationist Fairfield (Our Plundered Planet) Osborn, who argued that the world's baby supply is sadly outstripping the food supply. Most of the delegates were in no great mood to worry. They were interested only in the problem of childless couples who want children.

Among the facts and conjectures produced in the seven-day session:

¶ Emotional factors are enormously important in apparent sterility of both men and women, said Manhattan's Dr. Irving C. Fischer, and too little is known about how they operate in either sex. But since the emotions affect the chemistry and physiology of reproduction, every fertility clinic needs a staff psychiatrist.

¶ Proof that some couples' emotional problems are near the surface came from two Duke University researchers: in 150 couples who visited their clinic and were found to have nothing physically wrong, 80 wives became pregnant soon after Duke tests gave them reassurance.

¶ At least 10,000 U.S. babies have been conceived by artificial (donor) insemination in the past 15 years, and no major legal problems have cropped up. But New York University's Dr. Sophia J. Kleegman emphasized that the greatest care must be taken in selecting subjects. And, concerned about the uncertainties of public opinion, she thought it might be wise to change the name of the technique to "therapeutic insemination."

¶ In many cases of failure to conceive, said Rio de Janeiro's Dr. Arthur Campos da Paz, the trouble is that cervical secretions are hostile to spermatozoa. This can be established by a simple smear test. If the secretion is normally receptive, it dries in a marked, fernlike pattern; if it is hostile, the pattern is different or absent. And in such cases, doses of a female hormone may fix things up.

¶ A Dubliner, Dr. Raymond G. Cross, offered suggestions which made some of his colleagues blink: 1) because overheating of the testicles reduces sperm production, tight-fitting underwear is bad—a kilt is just the thing; 2) a man whose sperm output is below par should eat onions, garlic, bananas, celery, parsley, honey, cheese and molasses, and drink stout; 3) before trying to bring about conception, such a husband should remain continent for ten days to six weeks.