A new study initiated by University of California-Berkeley researchers reveals that flame-retardant chemicals called PBDEs, found in many household consumer goods at home, is likely to make it more difficult for women to get pregnant.

The study blames each 10-fold increase in the blood concentration of four PBDE (polybrominated diphenyl ethers) chemicals behind 30% decrease in the odds of becoming pregnant, each month.

Researchers analyzed PBDE blood levels in 223 pregnant women and asked how long it took them to conceive. It revealed that those with high levels were up to 50 percent less likely to get pregnant in a given month than women with lower levels.

However, the study doesn’t conclude that fertility is affected by the chemicals

The research additionally joins other animal and human studies that claimed that health effects from PBDE exposure and that 97% of U. S. resident’s posse’s significant levels of the chemicals in their blood.

The recent figures cite that pregnancy rate among American teens witnessed a rise of 3 percent in 2006, teen birth-rates jumped 4 percent, and abortion rates were up 1 percent.

Heather Boonstra, Guttmacher's senior public policy associate, cites the reasons for the increase are probably intricate and multi-fold. "We've been seeing declines in contraceptive use", she says, probably at least in part because of complacency about HIV, the AIDS virus that fuelled a rise in condom use among teens in the 1990s.