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Letters to Editor


Nature Medicine 7, 873 (2001)
doi:10.1038/90868

Optimizing human fertility and survival

Rudi G.J. Westendorp1,3, Frederique M. van Dunne1, Tom B.L. Kirkwood2, Frans M. Helmerhorst1 & Tom W.J. Huizinga1

  1. Leiden University Medical Center, Leiden, the Netherlands
  2. University of Newcastle, Department of Gerontology, Newcastle upon Tyne, UK
  3. e-mail: r.g.j.westendorp@lumc.nl

Whenever a gene for fertility is identified1, it is bewildering to think how variants associated with impaired fertility could have spread so widely in the population despite their obvious fitness disadvantage. Impaired fertility presently affects about 1 in 7 heterosexual couples in developed countries2.