Expert warns soya is bad for fertility

WOMEN who consume soya products for health reasons could be damaging their ability to conceive, an expert warned today.

A study found that even tiny amounts of an oestrogen-like compound in soya could prevent natural fertilisation in the female reproductive tract.

The chemical, genistein, causes sperm to "burn out" before they penetrate the wall of the egg.

Professor Lynne Fraser, an expert in reproductive biology at King's College London, says women hoping to conceive should avoid soya in order not to expose sperm to the compound in their bodies.

"If you drank a carton of soya milk I would think that would give you a reasonable dose of genistein," she added.

Professor Richard Sharpe, from the human reproductive sciences unit at the University of Edinburgh, said the results were interesting but pointed out that sperm may behave differently in the laboratory under test conditions and in real life situations.