Why Males Are Disappearing
And becoming more Feminized

A new report highlights the critical risks facing unborn males and male toddlers from gender bending chemicals found in everyday products. (the full report)

Boys born to women exposed to hormone disrupting chemicals have smaller penises, feminization of the genitals, are more likely to dress in girl’s clothes and play with dolls.

Male infertility is rising dramatically. Young men today are half as fertile as their fathers.

Male births are declining compared to females at alarming rates.

Phthalates, one of the main chemicals used as softeners in thousands of items, soap, rubber shoes, bath mats and soft toys, have been blamed for blocking the action of testosterone in the womb and are alleged to cause low sperm counts, high rates of testicular cancer and malformations of the male sexual organs.

Research suggest that male fetuses around 8-12 weeks after conception can be demasculinised by exposure to such chemicals. Three quarters of all cosmetics, skin creams, PCV plastic and thousands other product contain Phthalates and DEHP known to cause reproductive abnormalities – especially in males.

According to The Disappearing Male, a CBC Documentary, a must see for everyone, 7 billion pounds of one of these, Bisphenol-A, is produced annually – used in the production of poly carbonate plastic, baby and water bottles, thousands household products including the epoxy liner in canned foods.

We are all exposed. The unborn male is the most vulnerable.

Peat Myers, Chief Executive Officer of Environmental Health Science has been involved with the science behind this issue since it began. He describes with profound clarity how hormones bind with DNA which trigger protein expression – and how chemicals that mimic hormones, in this case estrogen, are altering human development around the world.

A New Picture of the Relationship Between the Environment and Health

Peat describes with profound clarity how these chemicals mimic hormones, in this case estrogen. He shares how hormones provide the triggers that cause DNA expression. The presence of the right hormone at the right time of development is critical.

P: Most people don’t have much knowledge about how hormones work, what they do, how they interact with genes.  It turns out that hormones basic function is to control the turning on and turning off of genes.  Genes are active throughout our lives.  They’re crucial in guiding development.  They have to be turned on or turned off at the right time so the right protein is present.  If this trigger is not there or another is at the wrong time, you may not have the right number of fingers.  Your brain may wind up being wired inappropriately. Genes are not these passive little things that we just inherit from our parents.  They’re active.

They’re a symphony throughout our lives.  A symphony needs a conductor and hormones are the conductors.  Hormones signals are generated by a wide array of factors.  Hormone signals guide the turning on and turning off of genes.  It’s called gene expression.  That’s central to life. 
 We’ve discovered that some contaminants, at extremely low levels are capable of interfering with the signals that are turning genes on and off.  They do that by mimicking hormones or by blocking hormones.  In one way or another some contaminants amplify or diminish the signals specific hormones should be sending. They interfere with the degree and timing of gene expression. Some aren’t being turned on or the trigger is happening at the wrong time. Some may be silenced permanently.

M:  What happens then?

P: There are problems.

M: You use the analogy of the symphony to describe how this constant array of triggering takes place.

P: It’s so exciting, so beautiful to see what nature has created.  But it has to work in the right way. Imagine Beethoven’s Fifth.  Imagine it’s going along, dunt-dunt-dunt, and then the note doesn’t hit.  That’s jarring to those of us know how is should sound.  It’s devastating if the gene that’s needed at that precise moment doesn’t fire in the development of an organism.  It’s devastating.

MM: Estrogen and testosterone, these have a lot to do with sexuality and reproduction.  Those seem to be pretty sensitive systems.  What are some of the indicators that you’ve seen about these chemicals affecting human sexuality and also behavior?

P: The most pertinent involves some new results that look at exposure in the womb to a group of chemicals called Phthalates that, from animal experiments, we know definitively act to de-masculinize and feminize males exposed in the womb.  There’s no questions about that.  We’ve got multiple cases documenting affects on behavior. We know some of the genetic signaling mechanisms that have been altered by exposure to these compounds.  The animal literature is really clear.

MM: The immune system is set like a thermostat and these chemicals are interfering with the setting.

P: Precisely. One of the interesting aspects of this science that’s come out over the last 20 years is you have both immediate affects and you have long term affects.  Take the affect of Bisphenol-A on prostate development.  It not only changes the size of the prostate, but it increases the numbers of what are called Androgyne receptors in the prostate.

The classic way for a hormone to work is that you have a hormone going through the blood, getting into the cell, and then the cell it enters into the nucleus.  And in the nucleus it combines with what’s called a receptor.  So you get the hormone and its receptor and together those two bind to and stimulate the DNA to produce something. You can alter how the system’s responding by putting more hormone in.  You can also alter it by having more receptors to receive the hormone.

This prostate study shows is that early exposures to very low levels can alter the sensitivity of the system throughout life by changing the receptor density, the number of receptors that are there to receive that signal and then cause the change in DNA expression.  So we’re seeing a potential for immediate affects by changing genes – now – and also we’re seeing lifelong patterns of altered sensitivity being set in place by very early exposure.

mm – This interview touches all of our lives today and for future generations!!