Teenage Boys More Likely To Father Child With Birth Defect Due To Mutating Sperm!

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Teenage boys are more likely to father children with birth defects due to high levels of DNA mutations in their sperm, research suggests. Boys’ reproductive cells go through six times as many mutations as girls’ during teenage years, and 30 per cent more than when they are in their 20s, a study of 24,000 parents and their children found, metro reports.

This means teenage boys have a two per cent chance of fathering a child with conditions such as autism, schizophrenia and spina bifida – 0.5 per cent higher than the rest of the population.
Lead researcher Dr Peter Forster, a University of Cambridge fellow, said the discovery is the first possible explanation as to why boys’ offspring were more likely to be born with defects.

He added: ‘It appears that the male germ cells accumulate DNA errors unnoticed during childhood, or commit DNA errors at an especially high level at the onset of puberty.’ Dr Forster hopes the study’s cell-counting technique could be used to treat relapsed cancer patients by determining whether tumours are linked to the original cancer.
Culled from metro.co.uk