Obesity bad for sexual health

In a study showing how obesity can harm sexual health, French and British researchers also found that obese women are less likely to ask for contraceptive advice or use the pill, and obese men are more likely to suffer from erectile dysfunction.

“In public health terms, the study lends a new slant to a familiar message: that obesity can harm not only health and longevity, but your sex life,” Sandy Goldbeck-Wood, a specialist in psychosexual medicine at Britain’s Ipswich Hospital said.

Compared to normal weight men, obese men were 70 per cent less likely to have had more than one sexual partner in the past year and two and half times more likely to suffer from erectile dysfunction. Obese men under 30 years old were far more likely to have had a sexually transmitted disease.

Sexual dysfunction was not linked to BMI in women, but obese women under 30 years old were less likely than women of normal weight to seek contraceptive advice or use oral contraceptives and were also more likely to report an unplanned pregnancy.

The study also found that obese women were five times as likely to have met their partner on the internet, more likely to have an obese partner, and less likely to view sex as important.