中國(guó)遭遇“精子危機(jī)”

Beijing’s efforts to reinvigorate China’s birth rate, one of the lowest in the world, face a serious obstacle as semen quality plummets among young male donors, research suggests.

研究表明，中國(guó)政府提升中國(guó)出生率的努力面臨一個(gè)嚴(yán)重的障礙——年輕男性捐精者的精液質(zhì)量大幅下降。中國(guó)是世界上出生率最低的國(guó)家之一。

Last year fewer than a fifth of young men who donated sperm in the inland province of Hunan had sufficiently healthy semen to qualify as a donor, according to a 15-year study of more than 30,000 applicants. In 2001 more than half qualified.

根據(jù)一項(xiàng)持續(xù)15年、對(duì)3萬(wàn)多名申請(qǐng)捐精者進(jìn)行的研究，去年在中國(guó)內(nèi)陸省份湖南捐精的年輕人中，只有不到五分之一的人精液足夠健康，有資格捐贈(zèng)。而在2001年時(shí)，超過(guò)半數(shù)申請(qǐng)者能夠合格。

Local media reports indicate Hunan is not the only province suffering a shortage in qualified donors. State broadcaster China Radio International recently reported that a sperm bank in Henan province had dropped minimum height and education requirements for donors and was offering to store their semen free of charge for three decades in an effort to make up its own deficit.

國(guó)內(nèi)媒體報(bào)道表明，湖南并非唯一一個(gè)合格捐精者不足的省份。官方的中國(guó)國(guó)際廣播電臺(tái)(CRI)最近報(bào)道，河南省的一家精子庫(kù)降低了對(duì)捐獻(xiàn)者身高和學(xué)歷的最低要求，并且免費(fèi)保存捐獻(xiàn)者的精子30年，以彌補(bǔ)精子的短缺。

“Growing evidence seems to suggest that male infertility is increasingly becoming a serious concern in the entire country,” said Huang Yanzhong, senior fellow for global health at the Council on Foreign Relations in New York. If shown to reflect a broader trend, such findings would further complicate China’s mounting demographic problems.

“越來(lái)越多的證據(jù)似乎都表明，男性不育正日益成為全國(guó)范圍內(nèi)的一個(gè)嚴(yán)重問(wèn)題，”位于紐約的美國(guó)對(duì)外關(guān)系委員會(huì)(CFR)全球健康高級(jí)研究員黃嚴(yán)忠說(shuō)。如果這些發(fā)現(xiàn)反映出一種更廣泛的趨勢(shì)，這將使中國(guó)日益加劇的人口問(wèn)題進(jìn)一步復(fù)雜化。

China’s fertility rate — the number of children a woman is expected to have during her child-bearing years — was 1.05 last year, according to data from the Chinese government’s annual “1 per cent” population survey, which polls about 17m citizens each year.

根據(jù)中國(guó)政府每年對(duì)約1700萬(wàn)居民進(jìn)行的年度全國(guó)1%人口抽樣調(diào)查，去年中國(guó)的生育率是1.05。生育率指的是女性在育齡期預(yù)期生育子女的總數(shù)。

The bottom territories in a World Bank 2014 survey — South Korea, Portugal, Hong Kong and Macau — had fertility rates of 1.2, against a global average of 2.5. That survey estimated China’s fertility at 1.6, still far below the 2.1 births per woman needed to keep a country’s population from shrinking.

在世界銀行(World Bank)2014年進(jìn)行的調(diào)查中，生育率最低的國(guó)家和地區(qū)——韓國(guó)、葡萄牙、香港和澳門——的生育率是1.2，而全球平均生育率是2.5。該調(diào)查估計(jì)中國(guó)的生育率是1.6，這個(gè)數(shù)值依然遠(yuǎn)低于讓一國(guó)人口免于減少所需的生育率水平——平均每個(gè)女性生育2.1個(gè)孩子。

China is ageing rapidly, leading to a shortage of young workers and warnings of a pensions crisis, but its fertility rate has long been in decline. From a peak of 6.4 births per woman in 1965 it had fallen to 2.8 by 1979, the year the notorious one-child policy was introduced amid fears of runaway population growth. That regime led to widespread sex-selective abortion, resulting in a significantly skewed sex ratio.

中國(guó)正處于迅速老齡化之中，導(dǎo)致年輕勞動(dòng)者短缺，引發(fā)有關(guān)養(yǎng)老金危機(jī)的警告。然而，長(zhǎng)期以來(lái)中國(guó)的生育率卻一直在下降。該指標(biāo)從1965年每位婦女平均生育6.4個(gè)子女的峰值，下滑到1979年的2.8。1979年，由于擔(dān)心人口增長(zhǎng)失控，中國(guó)引入了一胎化政策。該政策導(dǎo)致了普遍的性別選擇流產(chǎn)，致使性別比例顯著扭曲。

The blanket policy was scrapped late last year for a two-child policy. But previous loosening of the old policy has fallen short of policymakers’ hopes in raising the country’s birth rate, with many Chinese couples apparently unwilling to take advantage of the chance to have a second child.

這一全面政策在去年底被取消，取而代之的是兩胎化政策。不過(guò)，由于許多中國(guó)夫婦似乎不愿利用這一機(jī)會(huì)養(yǎng)育第二個(gè)子女，對(duì)舊政策的放寬未能實(shí)現(xiàn)中國(guó)政策制定者提高中國(guó)出生率的期望。

“The situation is probably worse than expected,” said Mr Huang, noting that the results of a government-commissioned national study on infertility in China that had been scheduled to end in 2011 had still not been made public. Some researchers also say previous census results have been manipulated by family planning officials in regions with a pro-birth policy, who inflate birth rates in order to make their policies look more effective.

黃嚴(yán)忠表示：“局面可能比想象的更糟糕。”他指出，中國(guó)政府委托開展了一項(xiàng)對(duì)中國(guó)不孕不育現(xiàn)象的全國(guó)性研究，該研究項(xiàng)目原定于2011年結(jié)束，卻至今仍未公布研究結(jié)果。部分研究人員還表示，在實(shí)施支持生育政策的地區(qū)，此前的人口普查結(jié)果受到了計(jì)生官員的操縱。他們夸大出生率，目的是為了令他們的政策執(zhí)行效率看起來(lái)更高一些。

The researchers in the Hunan semen study, published online in the journal Fertility and Sterility, say there is no clear explanation for why donors’ reproductive health declined so rapidly. But they point to “increased environmental pollution, including pollution of water, air and food”, as a possible explanation.

湖南精液研究項(xiàng)目的研究報(bào)告發(fā)布在學(xué)術(shù)期刊《生育與不孕》(Fertility and Sterility)的網(wǎng)站上。該項(xiàng)目的研究人員表示，對(duì)于捐精者生殖健康為何下滑如此迅速，目前還沒(méi)有明確解釋。不過(guò)，他們提到“包括水污染、空氣污染和食品污染在內(nèi)的環(huán)境污染加劇”是其可能原因。

However, World Health Organisation spokesperson Tarik Jašarevi? said the WHO could not yet determine with certainty which factors had caused deterioration in certain or multiple countries, as studies often employed different methodologies to analyse semen. He also cautioned that semen quality did not necessarily correlate directly with male fertility.

不過(guò)，世界衛(wèi)生組織(WHO)發(fā)言人塔里克•賈薩瑞維奇(Tarik Jašarevi?)表示，由于各研究項(xiàng)目中分析精液的方法往往各不相同，WHO目前還不能完全確定什么因素導(dǎo)致了特定國(guó)家或多個(gè)國(guó)家精液質(zhì)量的惡化。他還提醒說(shuō)，精液質(zhì)量不一定與男性生育能力直接相關(guān)。

“It should be noted that male reproductive health can be affected by many complex factors,” including lifestyle, the environment and concomitant diseases, he said. “More research is needed to enable sound guidance or policy advice concerning deteriorating semen quality.”

他說(shuō)，“應(yīng)該指出的是，男性生殖健康可能受到許多復(fù)雜因素的影響”，包括生活方式、環(huán)境及相關(guān)疾病。“關(guān)于精液質(zhì)量的惡化，需要開展更多研究才能提出完善的指導(dǎo)意見或政策建議。”