Chapter 365 2045: Concentration is Zero
In a mountain villa on Panay Island.
Sanjibada Layal was massaging his shoulders while Li Qingye was sitting on the sofa, holding a tablet in his hand and flipping through it with a frown on his brow.
[22nd Annual Report of the Medical Division of Sapiens Corporation…].
Through the company's management, the average life expectancy of employees in each branch has been raised to around 89 years old, and is still increasing rapidly.
This is due to the advantages of Sapiens in biotechnology. As the scale of the new human workforce expands, the average life expectancy will naturally rise sharply.
Li Qingye was not at all surprised by this. If the average life expectancy of employees could not be increased with such powerful biotechnology of Sapiens Company , that would be a problem.
The reason why he frowned was not because of the life expectancy, but because of another statistic mentioned in the report.
Based on the data from the medical division, they counted the physical condition of all employees within the company from 2019 to 2022 and found a very scary phenomenon.
The average sperm concentration of young and middle-aged male employees of the Hongsawadi Branch and Luzon Branch was 53.71 million per milliliter in 2019, 49.52 million per milliliter in 2020, 45.11 million per milliliter in 2021, and 42.83 million per milliliter in 22.
The situation is similar for the Siam branch, Malacca branch, Java branch and Borneo branch.
At the worst-hit Sing Tao branch, the level of some employees has dropped to 14.28 million per milliliter.
On the contrary, the decline at the Mada Island branch was relatively smaller, and the current average value is 86.71 million per milliliter.
Why does this happen?
At first, the medical division suspected that poisoning might have been carried out by hostile forces, but as the investigation progressed, they discovered that the situation within the Sapiens company was not an isolated case, but a common phenomenon around the world.
The more developed the region, the lower the male sperm concentration.
Among them, Europe, North America, Oceania, Japan and South Korea have the lowest concentrations, which are only about 10 to 20 million per milliliter.
Then there are the more developed regions, such as the Far East and West Asia, where the oil giants only have a level of 20 to 30 million per milliliter.
The third batch of regions are Southeast Asia and Latin America, with concentrations of approximately 40 to 50 million per milliliter.
Finally, the highest concentration is in southern Africa , where the concentration can reach 50 to 200 million per milliliter.
If this trend continues, around 2045, the sperm concentration of men in Europe, America and some more developed regions will drop to almost zero.
Other underdeveloped regions are probably not much better.
The Medical Division organized professional biological researchers and medical researchers to conduct a comprehensive study of this situation.
After analyzing the comprehensive physical examination reports of 800 million employees, and combining their jobs, permanent residence, daily diet, and living habits, the research team came to a shocking conclusion.
Genetic damage is the reason for the decline in sperm concentration and quality.
So why doesn’t a similar situation happen to women?
The reason is that there are differences in the germ cells of the two.
Once genetic damage occurs to male reproductive cells, they are unable to repair themselves, but can still survive for a period of time.
When a woman's reproductive cells suffer genetic loss, they will repair themselves. If the repair is successful, the egg can develop and grow; if the repair is unsuccessful, the egg will die.
It is precisely because of this characteristic that men pass on their own genetic damage to the next generation.
This leads to a very scary problem, that is, men's reproductive cells will become worse and worse and their number will decrease rapidly.
You should know that in the 1970s, statistics from developed countries showed an average level of 50 to 300 million per milliliter.
So what exactly causes widespread genetic damage in humans?
The answer is actually obvious.
There are two main reasons that can cause gene damage: ionizing radiation and chemicals.
Based on the historical development of developed regions, nicotine is the key chemical substance that damages genes.
The key to the damage of ionizing radiation to genes lies in the large-scale nuclear tests in the 1950s and 1960s, whose radioactive dust has been dispersed all over the world through atmospheric circulation.
This can actually be seen from the region.
There have been basically no large-scale nuclear explosion tests in southern Africa and Latin America, while other regions have conducted nuclear explosion tests to a greater or lesser extent.
In the Oceania region, Great Britain conducted nuclear explosion experiments in its deserts, and France also conducted nuclear explosion experiments in the South Pacific.
Not to mention Southeast Asia, there are many relics of American nuclear tests in the Pacific Ocean to the east; although India and Pakistan to the west conducted nuclear tests in their own deserts, the atmospheric circulation just happened to carry the air particles from there to Southeast Asia.
In West Asia and North Africa, Judah and France also conducted a number of nuclear tests there.
The timing of the two events is also very consistent. After the large-scale nuclear tests in the 1950s and 1960s, problems began to appear in human male reproductive cells starting in 1970.
As genetic damage accumulates over generations, the overall infertility problem among humans has become increasingly serious since the 21st century.
In the medical division’s investigation report, another very critical source of ionizing radiation that is often overlooked by many people was also mentioned.
That is X-ray angiography in medicine.
Why is genetic damage more serious in more developed regions? This has a lot to do with their mature medical system and very common annual physical examinations.
Although the ionizing radiation dose of X-ray imaging equipment is not high, its damage to genes cannot be ignored, especially for people who undergo regular physical examinations.
In underdeveloped areas, where medical resources are relatively scarce, some people may never have come into contact with X-ray equipment in their entire lives.
Through this series of studies, the medical division has identified the main culprits causing genetic damage to humans: radioactive dust, nicotine, and X-ray equipment.
However, this discovery is of no use in curbing the trend of human genetic damage.
The new human employees of Sapiens Company may be forced to quit smoking.
However, radioactive dust has already spread to every corner of human society through atmospheric circulation and water cycle, and some trace amounts of radioactive substances are difficult to completely remove.
X-ray equipment is almost indispensable in the current medical system. Even if Sapiens has magnetic field imaging technology, there is still no way to completely eliminate X-ray imaging equipment.
Li Qingye put down the tablet in his hand and sighed: "Humans are always good at destroying themselves."
Sanjibada Layal stood behind him, silently massaging his temples.
Li Qingye was very clear about the issue of genetic damage.
After all, he had genetically modified himself in order to gain the power of revenge, and now his sperm is still inactive.
This is typical genetic damage.
It is very easy to damage genes, but very difficult to repair and treat them.
He may not care about people from other regions, but the new human employees are his die-hard fans, and Li Qingye certainly does not want anything to happen to his subordinates.
However, the relevant technology of gene therapy is still not mature enough and is not suitable for popularization in a short period of time.
However, the problem of genetic damage is imminent. With the speed of development of Homo sapiens, even if the cause of the disease is understood, it will be difficult to curb the spread of genetic loss. It can only be delayed for a dozen years at most.
So now we have to find a way to solve this problem.
