A UAE fertility business is working to increase the success rate by removing the stereotype that women are to blame in what could be a controversial move to force men to undergo testing at the same time.
Fakih IVF, one of the largest fertility clinics in the UAE, says about one in every three cases of infertility is due to the man alone, while one-third can be attributed to the woman alone and the remaining third is a combination.
However, the statistics are not widely known, leading most couples to initially test only the woman.
“In most cultures, not just here, it’s always assumed that the woman – because she carries the child –is the cause of the lack of pregnancy,” Fakih IVF CEO Ziad Makhzoumi told Arabian Business.
“just because you can produce sperm doesn’t mean you can impregnate… You need healthy sperm and a healthy embryo to create a baby, but then you need a healthy environment to deliver a healthy baby.
“This is why we’re extending our service. We are insisting that we test both [the male and female].
“Not all organisations do that [but] it’s going that way because they’re realising that you need the two partners to match one way or another.”
Makhzoumi said while blaming the woman was common in most cultures, it was particularly a problem in the Middle East due to the patriarchal society.
Yet couples needed to embrace the truth to help build their national populations, a key issue in the Gulf, where expatriate communities often outnumber citizens.
“If you look at the macro-economics of it, at the end of the day you need a population that’s healthy and growing well,” Makhzoumi said.
“The Emirates has a total population of about 9m but nationals are close to 2m. You need those 2m to become more and more and run their own country and produce leaders who are healthy and a generation who are fit and well.
“We feel it’s something that should be seriously promoted and needs to be addressed because it could be seen as a sign of weakness or lack of manhood. If you develop cancer, there’s not much you can do, but if you’re infertile then most likely you can do something about it.”
Male infertility is often caused by hormone imbalances or blockages in the male reproductive organs, while a complete lack of sperm occurs in about 10-15 percent of infertile men, according to Fakih IVF.
Makhzoumi said male infertility had to be taken serious in GCC states because couples did not have the option of using donor sperm of a surrogate mother.
Fakih IVF sees about 8000 couples a year at its Dubai and Al Ain clinics, with a success rate of about 11 out of 14 in vitro fertilisation (IVF) treatments.
A significant rise in the number of Gulf couples seeking infertility treatment has seen IVF Fakhi open new clinics in Dubai and Abu Dhabi and complimentary medical centres in Abu Dhabi, Al Ain, Sharjah and plans for clinics in Bahrain and Qatar next year.
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