Society today is facing a barrage of challenges that hitherto hardly caused worry.
"There are so many weird diseases plaguing people right now," says Harrison Karanja, a Nairobi resident. "All these come from the food we eat today and the lifestyles we live."
If you ask the average Kenyan what is happening they will likely give the same answer in varied forms.
And so, that more and more couples are finding it difficult to bear children hasn't escaped the same judgement.
"Even when you walk along the streets of Nairobi the men you see don't even look like they can perform in bed," Harrison says.
Dr John Ong'ech, a Reproductive Health specialist, is cautious about supporting the hypothesis that modernity is causing infertility.
"In the absence of research no one can say for sure that modernity is to blame for infertility," he says.
Ong'ech, who heads the department of reproductive health at Kenyatta National Hospital, adds, "It is possible that because of widespread awareness more affected couples are coming out to confront infertility."
His comments notwithstanding, a team of scientists at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem have concluded that sperm count among men in the west have more than halved in the past 40 years – ending in 2011.
Among these men there has been a 52.4 per cent decline in sperm concentration and a 59.3 per cent decline in total sperm count, the analysis, published in the journal?Human Reproduction Update, said.
"The extent of the decline is heartache," Dr. Hagai Levine of Hebrew University of Jerusalem, the lead researcher, is quoted saying by CNN. "It's hard to believe... it's hard to believe for me."
However, by comparison, among men living in South America, Asia and Africa, the researchers didn't detect similar trends.
However, the study suggests, that these continents will be following suit as urbanisation encroaches other parts of the world.
Ong'ech argues, if indeed the Hebrew University of Jerusalem team found correlation between urbanisation and infertility then it wouldn't be farfetched to adduce the same for some cases in Kenya.
The decline in sperm count and concentration as indicated, the team writes, has led to a high proportion of men in Western countries with sperm concentrations below 40 million/ml.
A sperm concentration below this threshold is associated with a decreased monthly probability of conception, the team points out.
The study does not seek to find out why the men are showing declines in sperm count and concentration.
However, Levine speculates that "we are exposed to many chemicals we've never been exposed to before," a school of thought which Ong'ech agrees with.
"There are two major things here: environmental factors and lifestyle," Ong'ech says.
He goes on: "Pollution in our environment is evident everywhere. Then there are GMO foods that are quickly becoming part of our daily diet. The food that we eat is heavily grown with fertiliser."
Chemicals like pesticides, lead and fire retardants, interfere with hormone production in our bodies and hence interfere with production of sperms as well as maturity and release of ova.
It has been established that obesity is the result of unhealthy modern lifestyle. Dr David Thuo, an obstetrician gynecologist at Velvet Healthcare in Nairobi, says that obesity affects fertility.
He says: "As levels of sex hormone binding globulin decreases linearly with percentage of body fat. This leads to increased free androgen (masculine hormone) in women which then creates conditions that lower fertility."
Obesity, Thuo adds, is strongly linked to polycystic ovarian syndrome, an illness that decreases a woman's chances of conceiving.
According to Ong'ech, another undeniable factor contributing to infertility is sexually transmitted diseases.
"Diseases like gonorrhoea and chlamydia cause blocked tubes. In a promiscuous society therefore it becomes easier to find adults whose reproductive ability have been hampered by these diseases," he says.
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