Doctors question plan to screen military members for low testosterone

A day after Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth announced that U.S. service members over the age of 30 will be annually screened for "testosterone deficiency," doctors are expressing skepticism of the program and its goals.

Hegseth said all service members over 30 will be screened as part of their regular health assessments, and that younger ones will have the option of being tested to ensure that they "have the right testosterone levels to operate at your absolute best." If they are recommended for treatment, they'll have the option to receive testosterone replacement therapy.

Doctors flagged a range of concerns about the policy, which is likely to be costly to implement. National organizations including The Endocrine Society and the American College of Physicians recommend against general screenings for testosterone levels, which can fluctuate based on age, lifestyle and even the time of day.

"Testosterone in the normal range is not a performance drug," said Dr. Céline Gounder, CBS News medical correspondent and editor-at-large for public health at KFF Health News. "For a man whose level is genuinely low, replacement can help libido and mood a little. It has not been shown to sharpen thinking, fix fatigue, or make a healthy 30-year-old a better soldier."

Testosterone is a hormone naturally produced by the body. It helps maintain muscle and bone mass, and impacts mood and energy levels. It impacts libido and supports sperm production in men. But it isn't inherently linked to an increase in strength or capability, said Dr. Marcus Goncalves, director of the Holman Division of Endocrinology, Diabetes, and Metabolism at NYU Langone Health.

"The normal range is from 270 to 900-plus. Putting people on that scale has no link to how masculine they are or feel or look. Somebody could be normal at 350, somebody could be normal at 650," Goncalves said.

A number of factors can cause low testosterone, Goncalves said, including stress, poor sleep and overexertion. All of these may be common for service members, he said. Researchers have previously found that military training can impact testosterone levels.

But when testosterone levels decrease due to lifestyle factors, the effect is "transient and reversible," and the hormone rebounds naturally when the situation changes, Goncalves said.

There is no research to show that supplementing temporarily lower testosterone levels results in performance improvement, he added.

Levels of testosterone naturally peak in early adulthood, around the 30- to 40-year-old range, before dropping by about 1% per year, Goncalves said