Sterility (physiology)

Sterility is the physiological inability to effect sexual reproduction in a living thing, members of whose kind have been produced sexually. Sterility has a wide range of causes. It may be an inherited trait, as in the mule; or it may be acquired from the environment, for example through physical injury or disease, or by exposure to radiation.

Sterility is the inability to produce a biological child, while infertility is the inability to conceive after a certain period.^[1] Sterility is rarely discussed in clinical literature and is often used synonymously with infertility. Infertility affects about 12-15% of couples globally.^[2] Still, the prevalence of sterility remains unknown. Sterility can be divided into three subtypes natural, clinical, and hardship.^[1] Natural sterility is the couple's physiological inability to conceive a child naturally. Clinical sterility is natural sterility for which treatment of the patient will not result in conception. Hardship sterility is the inability to take advantage of available treatments due to extraneous factors such as economic, psychological, or physical factors. Clinical sterility is a subtype of natural sterility, and Hardship sterility is a subtype of Clinical sterility.