Children's Hospital of Philadelphia researchers surveyed the parents of 636 children -- parents of 318 children that had been diagnosed with brain tumors and parents of 318 children who were healthy. Based on the knowledge that heat damages sperm, they asked the parents to try to remember the frequency of exposure to excessive heat -- saunas, hot tubs and electric blankets -- in the three months leading up to the conception of their child. If the average age of children diagnosed with the two brain tumors the researchers were focused on, medulloblastoma and primitive neuroectodermal tumors, then the parents were being asked to remember back on average four to ten years. According to the researchers report, heat exposure among the men in the three months before conception appeared to be linked to brain cancer risk among the children. The researchers do conclude by stating that the idea that paternal heat exposure before a child's conception and increased risk of these childhood brain cancers must be considered speculative until more proof is found.
The last statement made by the researchers might be the most significant. Now that I have told you what BBC News is reporting about this study, which I assume the researchers in some form released to the news media, let me say I believe you could fly a space shuttle through the speculative link between heat-damaged sperm and childhood brain tumors based on a survey. How good is your long-term memory in recalling daily life four to ten years ago? How many ways can a man's sperm become overheated?
I hope in the case of this study, the news will come with a substantial and cautionary warning that it might very well be a connection of dots that do not connect. I can think of nothing more additionally painful for a worried father who is facing his child's cancer diagnosis, than to have it even suggested that his overheated sperm might be the reason for his child's suffering -- when in fact it might have nothing at all to do with his child's brain tumor. The only known fact about childhood brain tumors is that researchers are looking into environmental and genetic factors for clues, and there is little concrete evidence as to what causes childhood brain tumors.
