Scott LaFee, Contributor

Increased cellphone use may result in decreased male fertility, according to a new study (the latest of several over the past few years), but the evidence is not conclusive and some scientists dispute it altogether.

Researchers at The Cleveland Clinic evaluated 364 men for infertility between September 2004 and October 2005. They found that men who used their cellphones the most (more than four hours daily) had the lowest average sperm counts, and those who didn't use cell- phones at all had the highest.

Earlier studies had reported similar findings. A 2004 Hungarian study, for example, declared that men who carry cellphones in hip pockets or attached to their belts had a 30 per cent lower sperm count than men who did not.

But scientists for the Hungarian study and the Cleveland Clinic study, which was reported at a recent meeting of the American Society of Reproductive Medicine, were quick to say more research was needed, that a real association between cellphones and male fertility had not yet been proven.

And never will be, asserts Bob Park, a physics professor at the University of Maryland:

"The wavelength (of the cell phones) is far too long to have any direct chemical effect and the microwave heating from a cell phone is easily handled by the body's temperature-regulating mechanism. It's too small to affect sperm, even if you put the phone in your underpants."

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