Cosmonauts suffer from low potency and psychological problems

[Dover]

Cosmonauts suffer from low potency and psychological problems

02/11/2005 17:57


Rostislav Beleda worked as a sexologist in the Central Aviation hospital for many years. The doctor said that the heroic deed of space exploration was rather harmful to cosmonauts' health. When space conquerors returned to planet Earth, medics had to spend a lot of time teaching them most primitive things how to walk and be able to move normally, like any other human being. Weightlessness exerts a great influence on the muscle system, not to mention the nervous one: cosmonauts become rather short-tempered after space adventures. The development of the space industry returned new complaints from cosmonauts: Vitaly Sevastianov and Andrian Nikolayev confessed after spending 17 days in space that their sexual abilities suffered most, whereas other bodily functions were retrieving rather quickly.

The complaints became the main reason to establish a special laboratory in Russia to study cosmonauts' intimate problems. Space heroes were rather shy to come to the laboratory and talk about their problems in other doctors' presence. The majority of cosmonauts were asking for private conversations with the lab's chief.

When a spaceship enters the Earth's orbit, the human body experiences a change of blood circulation: blood starts flowing to the upper part of the body, whereas the lower part (beneath the waist) suffers from a shortage of blood supply. Internal organs gradually lose their functions because of the insufficient blood flow. Russian medics decided to rehabilitate cosmonauts by means of a special gear, which makes blood circulate actively in the lower part of the body...cont'd

http://english.pravda.ru/science/19/94/379/14955_space.html