Why couple infertility is historically a female-driven problem?

Abstract

Background: The history of studies in the field of infertility represents a chapter of great interest in gender issues.

Objectives: This paper aims to delve deep into the historical roots of the aspect of gender inequality related to couple infertility, with a journey back in time, from classical antiquity to the contemporary age, reporting junctions and metaphors linked to particular historical moments as well as to cultural and religious constructs.

Methods: This is a narrative review based on an extensive literature search of publications regarding the role of women in couple infertility over the centuries.

Results: Rarely in the ancient world, male infertility was taken into consideration, and the sources deal with it mainly indirectly. This attitude of "blaming" the woman for the lack of children had, in fact, strong social implications, which only the scientific research of recent years has managed to bring back into the context of a more egalitarian approach.

Conclusions: In the "journey" narrated in this article, the reader starts from the responsibility of couple infertility attributed exclusively to women in some ancient societies, whose central role was determined by their ability to procreate, going up to the medicalization of infertility in the contemporary age, which contributed to sharing with men this participation in the impossibility of having children.

Keywords: couple infertility; gender; history; infertility; medical humanities; medicine.