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HEALTH

The Claim

Low testosterone levels can be a cause of underweight in people of any sex.

Verified by Lenz ·

The Short Version

The evidence does not support low testosterone as a cause of underweight. Across the cited medical literature, low testosterone is associated mainly with increased adiposity, reduced lean mass, and weight gain or impaired weight loss, not low body weight. The claim also confuses loss of muscle with being underweight and overgeneralizes across sexes without support.

Caveats

  • Low testosterone can reduce lean muscle mass, but that is not the same as causing an underweight body weight.
  • Many reliable sources indicate the reverse relationship is common: obesity and metabolic dysfunction often contribute to low testosterone.
  • Cross-sex generalization is unsupported; the cited sources for both men and women more often link low testosterone to weight gain or difficulty losing weight.

The Receipts

  1. Impact of Weight Loss on Testosterone Levels

    PubMed Central (NIH)

  2. Weight Loss: Changes In Body Composition and Effects on Testosterone

    PubMed Central

  3. Testosterone therapy in hypogonadal men results in sustained and clinically meaningful weight loss

    Wiley Online Library

  4. Testosterone and obesity

    PubMed

  5. Testosterone and weight loss: the evidence

    PubMed Central (NIH)

  6. The Role of Diet and Weight Loss in Improving Secondary Hypogonadism in Men with Obesity

    PubMed Central

  7. Male Obesity-related Secondary Hypogonadism

    PubMed Central (NIH)

  8. Effects of long-term treatment with testosterone on weight and waist size in 411 hypogonadal men with obesity classes I–III

    International Journal of Obesity

  9. Approach to the Patient: Low Testosterone Concentrations in Men

    The Journal of Clinical Endocrinology & Metabolism

  10. Low testosterone in women: Signs, causes, and treatments

    Medical News Today

+ 25 more sources — see the full list on Lenz

Filed Under

testosterone

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