Sperm: A valuable canary in the coal mine

Forever chemicals, electronic smog, and processed foods commonly make mainstream news, but most people dont realise the implications. Scientists and holistic clinicians understand that all of the environmental factors and processed food chemicals create an increasing toxic load and are associated with inflammatory processess, changes to the gut flora and chronic disease. The emerging evidence that toxic exposure is enormously damaging to human reproduction is just frightening. Since the 1930's the quantity and quality of sperm has plummeted by over 70%. Sperm activity is highly sensitive to change making it the perfect Canary in the Coal Mine. In this episode Doctor and researcher Giselle Cooke discusses what can be done to assist male fertility. 

Transcript

Hello DR Giselle Cooke.

Hello, Mr Baden.

Well now I've got to make sure this interview doesn't get too silly because you and I go back a long, long time and.

Yes, you sat in the front row of. My class at nature care.

You and Michael Thompson were the nerds. And see what happened. You sit in the front.

Well, it just goes to show what a wonderful lecture you were.

Because I'm still here 35 plus years later. So well done, Giselle.

Ohh I don't know if I was in the inspiration that I hope I was.

so today is a really interesting topic because we're talking about mail and fertility in a case that you had, which kind of changed your life a bit because you went on to do a PhD based on this case. And. I was thinking about a topic for this podcast and I thought an appropriate topic might be something like human sperm. The Canary in the coal mine, because there's a lot of changes to humans. Them and since the 1930s, just the sperm count is down a remarkable 50 percent, 50% down since the 1930s. And I I know I've seen that statistic so many times that are always shocks me. Recently I was reading that 20% of men in the Western world would be considered infertile. That seems like an extraordinarily high number, so I'd love your input at some point as to whether you think that. Accurate and also from the RCGP I saw a little article that said male sperm issues account for up to 50% of all fertility issues and fertility issues are going through the ceiling as well. So there's a lot to talk about and you and your PhD are the experts. So thank you for joining me on this topic.

Thanks Daniel, and didn't quite soft on those figures actually the.

Emma.

Yeah, the sperm counts have been falling global. Probably about 60% since the 1930, so it's just it's escalating. So this is actually a crisis emerging and we've been watching it, you know, the IVF industry has developed because of a need to address this problem. And as you say, it's now considered about 70% male factor or male plus female factor is the reason for wisdom or say Australians in our case. But Westerners having infertility. So it's now thought that up to 70% of the infertility issue is male and it really is astounding to me that so little. Has been done to investigate why. Are sperm counts dropping? What are we doing about it? Are we just using these weakened sperm to produce weaker babies? And we're not really addressing the underlying problem so that men can conceive naturally.

Giselle. I'm kind of a stand up by that because we don't talk about it. We talk a lot about infertility.

I kind of feel through patients I've seen. The lakes that we talk a lot about female infertility and that's where the funding is, right?

I've had terrible trouble, you know, trying to get some funding from my research. In fact, I had to self fund my research now as the particularly interested in fixing the problem.

So then you start to wonder. Ohh. So why is this not something we should be addressing?

You say you know it's wonderful that we know so much about women, infertility and endometriosis, polycystic ovary syndrome. It's wonderful that we have so much knowledge about this now and it was when I was training in medicine. Always considered that women had more complex. Fertility issues, which we can. Have and it's best to be addressing having a full thorough check up before you go to the man to check up if his firm's OK now. That was back in the 70s and 80s. Since then, sperm qualities done the dive, but we haven't revived or reviewed. I should say the way we approach a couple who are infertile and said, why don't we do the sperm count first before we put women through all this often invasive and expensive and prolonged and time consuming investigation when if he has no sperm, we've got a problem here.

But then I've seen. I've seen terminology come back from patients or reports that I've read. Said that, have said things like when they don't know what the problem is and clearly they have an investigated the mail adequately. They say things like what they really want to say is we haven't got a clue, but they'll say the mother has a hostile environment and I got, I got that is just such rubbish, you know, because they're just not looking from and they can't say we don't know. Sorry.

Yes. Then if something. Link is on making an assumption.

Uh, that? Yeah, that's right. And that's a statement. That kind of means nothing really.

Well, it's a cop out.

Yes.

It's saying we've got to the end of our diagnostic process and because we haven't got an answer, we'll. We'll call it this. Yeah, because that. Looks just like it's in insurmountable, and there's couple will just have to go through and then vitro cycle to try and overcome the hostile environment. Now you can tell if a woman has a hostile uterine environment. You can check for antisperm antibodies and inflammatory. And activity in the in Demetrio learning can check their hormones so all of that can be assessed. There's no reason to palm off a couple and say that's the reason why you can't conceive, and that's actually what was told to my patient.

For what?

The reason why you're not getting pregnant after two IVF cycles and two years with a really capable naturopath doing all the best treatment and still not conceiving, and that was what they put it down to and he had clearly issues.

Well, let's talk about the he in this case and we call him. Pm and he's a when he came to see you, he was a 39 year old male and when he came to see you, how was he? I mean, what was his demeanour? How did he present to you?

Well, he's a businessman, corporate executive, very intelligent, very diligent and very thorough. So wanting to make sure he did all he. Could to help. His wife to conceive, and he was referred by his integrated dentist, which is an interesting thing, isn't it?

Right, okay, yes.

That it was up to the dentist to say, hey, why don't you go and find out what you can do about this? So really a second opinion for his primary infertility. He'd never conceived before so. He was a bit deflated and feeling like I've tried everything, but of course he hadn't at that stage and he really was unwell and his unwellness wasn't being addressed. I mean, it was just assumed because he was suffering with some allergies and he had some gut problems and bloating and after constant travel was required in his work role, he was constantly getting gut disturbances and no one was really addressing these things and it occurred to me some years before this that. When I was working with live blood analysis, actually with patients and couples and looking at the male and female in an infertile couple, and often I would see high allergy status, high gut dysbiosis in the husband or the partner trying to conceive, I thought, gosh, you know, why don't I fix this and see what happens? And then I would see that the the part that could sometimes concede. Move by fixing his issues so he wasn't well and that was a side issue. It seemed to anyone who was treating him. There was so fixated on. OK, you've got 2% normal sperm. You've got some there. We can. We can do something with that and that's the way the IVF industry looks at men. As long as you got some sperm. What? We'll do something with that. We'll pick out a good one. They use AI now to identify.

Ohh really?

Yeah. Identify what a potentially good sperm to inject into an egg.

When they're looking at those 2%, the whole medical term, there is is they're looking at the spa. Them morphology and my understanding what they consider healthy is something to be between 4:00 or 5% and 14%. Is that realistic?

So I spent morphology, which is the physical appearance of the sperm, so whether the sperm has 2 heads, 2 tails is has a very large head. Is it's warped in its appearance in some way. It's called an abnormal morphology, so normal morphology that used to be the figure was around 60% last century. So getting down to 2% normal forms is extremely low. The IVF industry says that 2 to 4% is the commonest range now for men in Australia, so most men who will turn up who are trying to conceive will have two to 4% normal forms and they are men a presenting for infertility reasons. It isn't enough, really, and it isn't just about the appearance of the sperm. They then need to look at the DNA fragmentation of this sperm and this is where the key lies, I think, and. This is where. I wanted to focus my research and I will be this year as well doing some further research in this domain. Looking at the fragmentation of the DNA of sperm, which may give abnormal morphology appearance that also functionality of this.

Them.

So if the acrosome cap of the sperm has an enzymatic defect and it can't penetrate the egg, there is a DNA defect there as being trying to be passed on. You know, if you like and if you use that sperm to inject into the egg and bypass the genetic defect you're passing that defect come to the child. There is actually a concern now that bypassing some of these genetic defects is breeding a generation that is infertile. And we're now seeing the men who are 30 age conceived by IVF now trying to conceive, and some of those having difficulty conceiving or so.

Rather, it's super scary because global fertility rates have dropped significantly, and in fact, for the first time ever, they're talking about a decrease in the human population over the next 40 to 50 years.

Yes.

So this is all quite a scary Giselle, yeah.

This is happening now, and yes, it's pretty relentless when you think about it. Now we were talking earlier about the sort of things that be contributing to this problem like. Often men will be have a sperm count. Done it. It'll say normal count, but what's happened to the quality of a sperm and the sort of factors globally that are impacting fertility in men? Chemical exposure is a huge 1, so environmental chemicals is considered to be the single most disruptive impact on male testes the pesticides herbicides because of there

What sort of what sort of chemicals?

Endocrine disrupting chemicals are the ones that are. We're concerned about because this will impact a man's testosterone status. But also there are some research going on at Newcastle University and many universities, but I'm closely working with Professor John Aitken at Newcastle, looking at specific DNA damage by environmental chemical exposure. So I mean, we're looking at the moment at things like forever, chemicals and so on that accumulate in the tissues of men and may continue to cause DNA damage in the replication of sperm.

So this is the PFAS chemicals that you find in takeaway containers and fire fighting. Equipment.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Sorry, fighting phones that should say.

I can talks about BPA. Is a really big one.

Uh huh. Okay.

So the plastic, so the soft plastic compounds. So these are the ones that they're most concerned about. Does anything that you know could be acquired through food, so shrink wrapping along food and applied through, you know, water bottles, you know, drinking from a soft plastic water bottle and sitting in the sun. And so you think of that as a global issue as well?

Yeah.

We're trying to deliver water in bottles to many nations.

Stupid.

The hygiene reasons. Yeah. We're also delivering the plastics.

Yeah. Just so I'll listeners can understand the relevance here. Um, cells like human sperm and some other cells in the body are very rapid turnover cells.

That's right.

So because they're rapid DNA turnover cells, they're more susceptible to chemicals and endocrine disruptors. Microplastics. Probably and these other forever chemicals as well. And that's long.

Yes.

And also yes, Sullivan. Do you think about men working in different industries where they're exposed to solve? I mean, pilots, toluene, you know, fuel, you know, things that have a fume about, you know, that new car smell that men tend to like.

Life.

And they keep getting new cars. And they're plastics are.

That's.

Out gassing in there in this contains face and they're breathing that in. So it's that those sort of.

Yeah. And he's a here's a tip for young players, because, ladies and gentlemen, Giselle and I are fairly new grandparents. And this is a very exciting time in our life.

However, the one thing I do when someone brings over plastic toys and blow up toys and all that. Sort of thing. I make sure that there outside blown. Up both to where? Just to outgas as much as we possibly can, and I would certainly top shelf, certainly encourage everyone to, you know, Google outgassing plastics and find ways to to try to decontaminate the vapours as much as you possibly can, yeah.

Hmm. Put them on the top shelf.

Yes. Yes. Yeah.

And you think about our modern internal environment. We talk about internal air pollution and all of the materials.

Yeah.

The MDF particle boards and so on that are used in building now. So all of them are the height that's out.

You.

I think. So. Enormous, our environment has changed so much in. The last 50-60.

Do you?

Years our internal environment, interior, environment, much more hazardous and then men are working in hazardous occupations and do as much as they can.

Yeah.

Don't always wear their. Masks, when they should be, but being exposed knowledge.

To your. Have there been studies that differentiates sperm quality and motility? Be and quantity through professions.

Yes, yes, there are studies and I'll have to search. Them for you.

That's OK.

I've. Got my in my Endnote library.

So the other factors other than chemicals, I would imagine that have an impact on sperm overall, the age of the male and lifestyle choices are meaning, diet, smoking, potentially recreational drugs I don't.

Yes, yes.

Yes.

Know what do you think?

Well, yes, that this patient was 36 and his life was and and now he said he, not his wife, has 36. So this is not a good age to try to conceive, right?

Ohh.

Men do lose fertility as they age, so as our cells age, so ageing and obesity are the two single big contributors to infertility in males and environmental exposure to electromagnetic radiation is.

Those. 2nd.

Serious respect and you think of this is an executive mail and he was on an aircraft a lot. Do you think about the cosmic radiation? Greens mobile phones, Wi-Fi. You know, Wi-Fi itself can disrupt sperm motility for four hours after it turned.

Hmm.

Wow.

Off. So if you think of a couple trying to conceive at night and they've left the Wi-Fi on boom, motility can be disrupted by that. Wearing a mobile phone on the hip is in the region. Of the testes. Will stuns firm actually done my own? Study. For the patient who has 0 motility.

Right.

And I got him to stop making calls. Is. Fun on the car seat between his legs on a cradle and then his sperm motility returned.

Yeah. That's not well. I was going to say that's not. That's not the plan words.

Ohh.

I'm sorry, but I I've actually had two patients that have had cancer in their left testicle, both of them, and they both kept their phone in their left front pocket.

Ohh wow gosh, yes, that that is a little.

I and I.

Rare, isn't it?

Yeah, I think so. But I I I guess you've just once again got this organ that's turning over a lot of cells, highly active organ and therefore more susceptible on the radiation.

Yes, yes.

And the radiation that brought in the cell division, that's  it cutting.

Yeah. Yeah. Yes, absolutely. Just completely.

I love you. Said, you know about older dads as well. I mean, these couples may conceive, but then what's happening to the quality of the embryo in an older man or a man who's had DNA fragmentation? And  the child has survived past 12 weeks in pregnancy and the majority of early miscarriages are due to poor quality sperm.

Dry.

There we see up to 12 weeks. I should say so. Up to 12 weeks, repeated miscarriages can be linked to poor sperm quality, so the fever's becoming nonviable. We see there's a lot women having to have DNC because the child stopped growing, the heartbeat stopped and then if they get a full term.

Yeah.

What?

Sorry and the mutational load of these babies that have been conceived with poor quality DNA. Okay. Then we sing birth abnormalities, and then we're seeing in older debts are much higher incidence of autism and depression. Epilepsy and bipolar disease, according to Professor Aitken in older father's consent.

And what about food quality? I mean, food quality's been chaos.

Yes.

Jane for a lot.

Yes.

Of people and and, you know, just the rubbish. A lot of people eat, to be honest, are highly processed foods, is getting a lot of media attention right now.

Yes, of course.

Yes.

But it's been an issue for a long time plus other. Non nutritional foods people just.

Yeah, listen, there's a few points there, stranger.

Just the film starts with. Okay. You have any friends?

Yeah, in Australia, sorry. I keep jumping in because.

No, no, that's exciting.

I said it's please. Yes.

Come on.

Um, yes, in Australia, typically our soil is very zinc deficient. You need zinc for cell replication. For sperm count, particularly so a man eating what he thinks is a healthy diet may or may not have adequate zinc unless he is trying to conceive.

Yeah.

He would need to be supplementing. But also you say about poor quality foods friends. Thats pro inflammatory foods. This is the thing I started to look at in these men who had gut I. Use and. I thought, gosh, you know what? If there's gut inflammation, could that be causing some crossover effect on the testers? And then I found a study which just light went on for me. That showed that the greater the gut inflammation, the more permeable the blood test is barrier becomes. So there is a link between intestinal inflammation. Then a butyrate levels so. If you have intestinal inflammation, often you have microbiome dysbiosis. Sorry, they're wrong. Makes of gut flora not producing protective butyrate, short chain fatty acid which would normally maintain the blood testers barrier. So this inflammation directly making a porous blood test as Barry. Endotoxins leaking across into the testers, causing cellular damage, so that was a the line of thought I had with why would I look in the gut of a man who's have has a DNA fragmentation issue? And so that's where I started looking. Wealthy gave probiotics to men. Could we rescue the gut? Could we improve sperm quality? And there's actually been some preliminary research done in Spain, only a very small group of men given probiotics, Lactobacillus and bifidobacteria. Um to rescue fatigued sperm so it actually improved sperm motility and count. So low quality of food is crucial. As you say, if you just thinking I'm just the man, I don't have to do anything special. You know, in this conceiving a baby, you know drinking lots of alcohol, doing drugs that. Would know that.

The.

Yeah, clearly. Sorry, big one. The carcinogens and the mutagens which are in cigarette smoke, so smoking, social and recreational drugs and alcohol, so alcohol above all really causing mutational load.

So I guess with the gut permeability issues there were there are two potentials 1 is that you know the the the toxic? Chemical itself crosses over and can directly affect the sperm, but it can also, I guess as a secondary effect, create an overall immune issue, creating an overall inflammation and have a secondary knock on effect from that inflammatory response as well.

Yes. Yes.

Does that resonate with what you're doing?

Yes. Well, we do know this higher infertility in men with all kitis, so inflammation of the testis, obviously all previous injury.

Ohh God.

But I'm still wondering now whether it's even that obvious that there's inflammation. May be it's just the microbiome of the testers, the microbiome of the sidemen being disrupted could be enough without any other. Perceivable inflammatory activity, but yes, definitely inflammation proven inflammation of the test has proven to reduce fertility, but there's more research being done now on the semen microbiome of men and the semen microbiome.

Yeah.

Of the testers. So I think we're still early days and we just don't know enough to say this is the healthy microbiome of a man whose fertile, but we're about to look into it.

But Giselle, I'm being a big supporter of of probiotics and prebiotics for my whole career. The one thing that I that hasn't been nailed yet, really in my view, is how or how to know which probiotics to give, which individual we still lack the big studies, so we understand which population requires which probiotic or, you know, there's. I think I read a few years ago that 90% of the probiotic studies were coming out of China, which is great, but the Chinese diet is very, very different to the Australian diet and the quality of water or the, you know, where they live and and China is a massive country and some in the mountains, some in the desk. But so we look at these studies and we we try to incorporate them as best we can to our understanding. But how do we do that? Is there a way or or is there? Have we not got there yet?

Owns a few things. I mean, the study that was in 2017 in Spain Bell case, it set etal. And they looked at two strains only. Yeah, in nine. And and you cannot extrapolate too much from that.

But it's Just curious that it was Lactobacillus Ram Nosis CCTV8361 and Bifidobacterium longum, CEC T7347. So they have specific strains that they use that they actually found that improved the DNA fragmentation. It's sold in these men, so small study, but leads on. As you say, there should be funding for bigger studies. So I actually approached Diabet Australia last year and said, look, I've done my research which I had to do in an animal model because I was really obstructed from trying to bring this idea to my research colleagues who said what makes you think robotics could make any difference to spend quality. And I said, well, this is what I understand as a holistic practitioner that got and fertility are very connected in women. They will be very connected in. And then I went to Ivy. Frustrated. Then just now I mean some many years on starting to understand the importance of the role of the microbiome. They understand what probiotics are, so they've said to me we can do it. A pilot study 30 to 60 infertile men, and we'll actually look at the semen microbiome of these them characterise it and then we will give. As a probiotic now, so how do we choose that? Because we don't have enough data up till now to identify the species, but through all the research that been done so far, which is quite rudimentary, Lactobacillus dominant semen is the one that is associated with fertile men and prevotella dominant semen is one that we see in infertile men. So we're just gonna try to find a shift. That's all you can really do. As you say, diet is crap. 2. And we're gonna have to standardise a diet and then most special thing about the diet in this case is prebiotic fibre, right? Yeah. So if you put the bacteria in as the naturopath who treated this patient earlier had given probiotics to this patient did improve his condition, but not to the point where his fertility had improved. But his problem is prebiotic status was not good because he was constantly travelling and not on a healthy diet. So getting men to prepare for concept. Question. By improving the quality of the diet so that they can support their own microbiome, a healthy microbiome is the optimal way so that you'll get a much broader microbial diversity than you would if you're taking a probiotic supplement, which will narrow the diversity. Right.

Yeah. So in this patient he travelled and he'd had a history of some. Got issues, probably related to his travel. Perhaps he picked up some sort of Organism or parasite, but many men, I think, ignore their gut issues.

Yes, I yeah. Yes.

Uh, you know, and I guess one of the take home messages from this conversation is if you're a male and you're you're trying to conceive, you've gotta pay attention to your body and what your body's saying and justice because you fart a lot and you think all men do.

Yes, that's what made me assume. It's going to be a problem. Ohh man do.

You know it's, I guess it's so important for men just to connect with their own bodies more. Hopefully some of this will resonate.

Yes, and not just in preparation for conception. I mean, if your health is so poor that you've got 2% normal sperm. And what does that saying about your whole health? And there actually is some research saying why are we not using semen analysis as a biomarker for male health? You mean it should be? It's such an easy sample to collect. It's such an easy test to do. Why are we not routinely doing semen analysis as a work up on men to look at their overall health? If I had my way, I would be asking men to do similar analysis and microbiome screening. At the moment you can only get an intestinal microbiome screen. We can't get semen microbiome screening done commercially, but we can get it done in research capacity. But those two tests have you have a look at what your microbiomes doing and you look at what yours sell quality is, then you've got a lot of information. It will lead to. Are you being poisoned? You know, have you got radiation exposure? Are you getting adequate nutritional intake? Have you got an inflammatory process going on? So we could tell so much so quickly so. Soon in the process of investigation.

Yeah. Look, I think you should run for Federal health minister. You would have my vote.

The only talking about Spiderman ever have fun guys.

OK, so so TM came in to see you. You'd identified that there were some gut issues he'd had a you'd set him up for a comprehensive diagnostic stool analysis, and it came back with a number of parameters showing some changes, some issues that the gut microbiome, some issues with his digestion of certain fats and fibres and that sort of.

Yeah.

Thing, but also some parasites in there and one of the parasites from the report I'd seen suggested that he had had quite high levels of blister sisters Homeliness, and now we may we may not agree on this point, but I consider blastocystis hominis to be a commensal. We all have it and I look at it as a a barometer of overall health.

Yes.

And so when everything else on the gut is not right, I've always thought bosses sisters would take the opportunity to rise. But I've never personally considered it as the major issue. I've always considered it as the bench. Back and said the success of other therapies I've doing with that patient, what are your thoughts around that?

I've got lots of thoughts about Gloucester sisters.

OK.

So stool cultures and still particularly the PCR in the early days back in the 90s, we weren't seeing it that much in the stools generally.

Right.

But as the population in Australia became very mobile, specially for work and people were having holidays overseas in areas where you pick up parasites that easily, I was seeing people coming back from India, Asia, Southern Europe and bringing back a lot more parasites. And I think that they've flourished because of our. Sibling and now, as you say, probably I would say one in every two patients has Buster Sisters, but I don't see every single stool culture coming back now that we're doing DNA assessment, we are able to pick up if it is actually tiny amounts. This CDs was actually a culture. It was a parasitology culture, so there was enough bug there to. Activate now one lot of research says GPS will say 1% or sorry. One plus is what they would categorise it as blaster. Sisters is normal and asymptomatic. However, every time I treat someone that has that result and I give the man's parasitic herbs, these low level discomfort symptoms. Ohh way so I I suspect that Lester sisters may be common but not a healthy commensal. So I think they're commonly present. So I always treat Blaster sisters. There is a microbiome researcher in the UK, Tim Spector, who says it's good to have a blaster sisters, he said. Everyone should have a bit because it improves your allergy status, so he believes that a little bit will prime the immune system. Now this patient actually had allergic conjunctivitis and rhinitis. Andy had Leicester. This this so as this one case. But the the thinking constantly mutating about this, so I don't know that it's a nasty pathogen when there. Is. Significant amount of it. Yes, I think it needs to be treated. I always treat it just in case in that person it is all a level that is causing mucosal injury, so that's my concern and I do see iron deficiency commonly in people who've been carrying a load of blastocystis. So the time and we know that what this parasite does interfere with iron absorption.

Do you have any? Absolute favourite herbs. Anti parasitic herbs that you look for. Or perhaps they're in a product that you find good results with for parasite.

Yeah, well, I've always used Ching Hao, which is a Chinese Wormwood. And that one I find a very specific for Blaster Dientamoeba. Or it's very well. And I will combine that with the individual patient depending on. What else I see? I tend to keep away from Berberis and the berberine containing herbs for any long term use, but certainly a short course. Berberine, Aquifolium and hydrastis. Jason Hawrelak, the microbiome Guru, says it nukes the microbiome.

Right. OK.

The berberine. She just got to be quite gentle with it, but I do have a fantastic formula, but a wonderful match path gave me some years ago and I find. It works really. Well, and it's not herbs that are specifically indicated. Normally. The parasites that it. Works, so one of the herbs is manuka. So, as in New Zealand, tea tree, holy Basil Tulsi and the third one is kava.

Ohh kava.

Ohh, and it's interesting that you know Carver may be in the tropics. You know, it's quite protective against parasites, but that's my go to three when I have a patient with blast. Ohh and it breaks the cycle in pretty much every patient. I'll add some extra herbs like I tend to like putting my jella in a formula now. Yeah, you've done some lovely work on Nigella when you're of biomedical and your product is my go to with so many of these patients because it supports a healthy microbiome and keeps these pathogens down.

Yeah, yeah. It's amazing, herb. Yes.

So sort of go for it with those 3 antiparasitics plus the Nigella for bit of. A hormone regulation and garlic of temper. Those things into Giller.

So, given that most parasites work in a six week reproductive cycle, do you prescribe the herb continuously for six weeks or two cycles? How do it?

Do you think usually 8 weeks and maybe 12 depending on the symptoms, though there by the patient's symptoms now in this case, this patient had unformed stools, so good unformed stools and bloating, cramping, and so on, and watching those.

Right.

Yeah, OK. Yeah.

The terms often patients will just say I just felt like a veil lifted after the treatment and so maybe there's a level of energy depletion that operating with and that gets better.

Brought.

So yes, if you're using a drug, obviously you give a dose now and a dose in two weeks to get the eggs that have hatched six weeks ago. We usually do at least eight weeks, maybe 12, depending on the symptoms and how long that patients had it. One lady had had blastocystis Ant infestation for 20. Is being a flight attendant flying in and out of India and I yeah, had to treat her for 12 weeks, but that completely resolved her issue.

Hmm.

Ohh, you mentioned India, which just reminds you of a study I read in a journal called Nutrients in 2020. In this study, they one of the best travel medicines you can give a patient if they're travelling  is turmeric. Um, because it is. It is one of the best regulators of your normal microbiome. Have you come across that at all? No.

I don't think that's the case. From my research, wonderful digestive, right?

OK.

Garlic is the one I would be thinking keep pathogens and particular cause. It's great for your fungus and youth. It's great for your parasites and it's great for your bacteria. I don't think not. In my research I must have missed something. There really, with turmeric and I wouldn't know like anything really bitter as you know. You know, it's very restorative for the gut. Whatever you can do to improve the gut million. Will it be local immunity? So maybe it's through that means.

In holistic medicine, particularly herbal medicine, and I'm just wondering if this relates to this particular patient of yours. We often talk about a die off, so when you give someone a parasitic formula, they may go through a temporary worsening of symptoms, whilst the parasite, which is a living Organism, tries to survive and cause aggravated symptoms for a short period of time. Did this patient experience that or have you experienced that with many patients in this in this situation?

Well, this patient was travelling again, so the treatment that I gave him, he was on his way to Zurich. And so he took the treatment while he was travelling. And so I don't know how aware he was, and he lived with so much cramping and discomfort for so long. I don't know. He could have told. Whether there was a day off, but you were right.

Ohh.

I do want patients about the die off, particularly bacterial die off, I think is even nastier. Parasitic die? Elf and just think the endotoxins are released from bacteria when you send out caprylic acid and garlic.

OK.

I find patients get more sick with that than knocking off parasites. I should say I just find patients just like they're emerge from a level of unwellness they don't get unless it's a really high load. But I wouldn't be treating them with. But you know, I would be recommending they take a drug if they've got a high load of parasite and sending it to get some flagel Fagen.

Because normally 90 is a very high dose of herbs which is pushing the boundaries sometimes.

Well, that's right. Then the risk of causing an adverse reaction with those.

Yeah, exactly. When he came back to see you, how was he feeling?

Yeah. So he said that he had less flatulence. He's feeling less blog. Good. He also had a higher workload, so he was still feeling tired. His allergic symptoms were worse because he just bought a dog and he was actually allergic cause I think he hadn't had a. Baby at that stage. So he bought a Beagle and apparently we're sensitive dog, so it couldn't tell whether the fixing up the gut actually helped his allergies state. And he was taking antihistamines. And as you have taught me. That the non sedating antihistamines can prolong the activity of histamine and this is so you. Find people who taking those long term are suffering a. Level of low. Level chronic allergy that you can't break until you give them Nigella, right? Seaton and Scott was improving and you know that was a thing that he was. He was referred to me for that reason, but that was the thing that we found that we needed to treat and as he saw it, he wanted to address the gut dysbiosis. So we did some more stool testing and you know, his stools were formed, at least have been the semi formed.

Pet.

Four, he was digesting starch. Better cause he'd been male absorbing starch before, so that would have given him a bit of bloating. Maybe have SIBO at the time he was Malvern jesting, fibre so his Michael Byrne wasn't right, but his colonies of Leicester had reduced and then he was really happy because his wife was then 22 weeks pregnant. And.

Hmm.

Ohh so.

We were talking about his gut, but he said by the way.

Ohh yeah, what do I come here for?

Yeah. Why was it going to this like yes.

Well, yeah, obviously microbiome had. Improved his.

Well.

He's healed his gut. You know the permeability had had obviously started to mend.

Well, it's sunny association, so I can't prove it, but might cause he'd had a lot of digestive nutritional work with the naturopath for two years before he put him on a low inflammatory and dairy free gluten free diet and 12 types of supplements and all those things would have set groundwork for his recovery. I suspect that until you take the pathogen out and she she had been giving probiotics and so on, I think until you remove the pathogen, you can't initiate the. Feeling so, I think that was the clinch. You know, just identifying there was a parasite, getting rid of that, well, knocking down the colonies cause you don't have to get rid of blaster as you were suggesting. But just reducing the load and enable that sort of tipping point of his immunity. And then his ability to absorb his nutrients, maybe his zinc and all the other contain and essential fatty acids and all the things you need to make healthy sperm. So I suspect that's what happened, because he started to form stools, his gut was less in a in a state of alarm. And yes, spent quality improved somehow. After you know two rounds of IV, F2 years of nutritional work, and then just one course of Paris airport.

Ohh, isn't that wonderful? And and some zinc.

And soon zinc.

I think it's.

And provides.

So underwriter, doesn't it in in men?

Yeah.

Yeah, that'd be giving probiotics at that stage as well.

Yeah. What a wonderful case.

Yeah, that's right. This going to the the basics. Where are the issues here? I know it's going back to. There was them and DNA fragmentation. Something was causing damage and he had gut issues. What was causing the damage? So drilling down and finding the culprit I think is the thing.

I want to go ahead that comment. What a comprehensive discussion. This has been so. I'm going to have to sit back and. How to get into my head, but wonderfully?

Ohh, and he did bring in a beautiful photo a year later of his beautiful little son.

Yes.

So he did have a healthy child, which? Is the other thing that was very important.

From the time he came to see if to the time he announced the pregnancy was about a year of. Work.

Yes, that's right.

With a lot of travel in between. So it's probably delayed it all a bit, but yeah, yeah.

That's fine, that's fine.

So, Giselle, what are you doing now?

I have this research project so that I'll be commencing this year with IVF Australia, so we're going to do characterisation of the seaman microbiota. I'm of a cohort of infertile men. And then once we've done that, we're going to use a probiotic intervention with those men and we're going to specifically track sperm DNA fragmentation. Now, there aren't too many labs that will do this test because it's expensive equipment, so that's why a lot of men aren't getting that test done in their semen analysis. So specialist tool, but I think that's where we have to look because. We're not only seeing. Inability to conceive. But we're seeing early pregnancy loss and a lot of these infertile men.

Yes.

So we want to look at improving sperm quality and after all, you know, in a natural conception, an egg chooses the sperm does she chooses the one that she thinks it's most robust. So we've got to do something about the robustness and the quality of sperm.

Yes.

And so in my practise as well, I'm offering screening for men who have been on the infertility challenge on the job. Me. And if they haven't really had any holistic advice about what to do about their poor quality sperm reports, there is so much that can be done. As you were saying, with diet, smoking, obesity, environment, chemicals, new cars and.

Yeah.

And your industrial exposure and all the things that you. Could possibly do something about to improve outcomes.

Because for many decades now, we thought it was just about wearing tight undies. But it's more than that.

Yeah.

Yes. And that was a factor.

But I think the.

World has got more toxic and we have so much electromagnetic smog that we live in these days. Compared to 10 years ago, 20 years ago.

Ohh yeah.

Carrier PDA in our pockets. Men very close to their testicles, as you said, and you would say most men.

Would do that.

They carry their phone on their body. So that's the first thing is phone off. Everybody on the desktop and not anywhere near the pregenital tissues.

Which is all her other people get in touch with you.

Well, I am practising from Jen Biome, the practise the integrated medicine practise in Edgecliff. So I see patients face to face there on a fortnightly basis. And I do telehealth consultations for patients who aren't in the eastern suburbs. Or find it easier to do it that way,  Sorry, Wednesday, Thursday, Fridays practise.

Right. So it's “GenBiome”

That's correct.

Yep.

And you also mentioned in a preliminary discussion that Professor John Aitkin has a book.

Hmm.

Yes, for those interest in this correct me if I'm wrong. “The infertility trap”

Yes, the infertility trap John Aitkin, and this was published and let's see.

Uh huh.

Me. It was 2022, so it's very recent.

Right.

He talks very much about the hazards in modern life. He talks about the catastrophe of falling male fertility in the world and he talks about things that can be done about it and he. Talks about his. Research into chemical injury and he also talks about the poor outcomes of the IVF industry and calls to account the responsibility, the moral responsibility of an industry that may be offering hope. To people and maybe increasingly mutational load carried by the children that they produce. So that is a real it's a social dilemma.

And the cost to the patient and the injectables mainly by the female side effects, all the hormones, all of that stuff is is very challenging to a young.

Yes, yes. Who? Cool.

Ohh so hugely stressful way to start a family.

Yeah, absolutely. Giselle, this has just been absolutely wonderful. I've loved connecting with you again. Thank you so much and. Okay now.

Thank you for giving me this opportunity to speak about this because I think it awareness needs. To be right.

Your passion and knowledge shine through like nothing else. Thank you so much. Take care.

Thanks, Daniel. Cheers.