Up to a quarter of active-duty Army members could receive a low testosterone result from mandatory military screening, despite the true prevalence of the condition likely being a tiny fraction of that figure, according to a study published Thursday in JAMA. The finding adds to concerns that the mandatory screening announced by Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth in July will lead to a cascade of unnecessary medical evaluations for military members. Those evaluations could result in inappropriate testing, inaccurate results and diagnoses, and overtreatment that could cause harm, including infertility.
Medical experts, including the Endocrine Society and the American Urological Association (AUA), have recommended against blanket screenings for these reasons. Still, the Pentagon has moved forward with the plans, releasing clinical guidance in September. The JAMA study highlights the reasons why testosterone levels are not measured in men without symptoms—and also offers a glimpse of how many Army members could become ensnared in the clinically dubious screenings.
Researchers at the Pennington Biomedical Research Center in Louisiana and the US Army Research Institute of Environmental Medicine in Massachusetts conducted the study. The researchers drew data from a large military health survey, which included members at five US Army installations. The survey data included morning blood draws from fasting military members.
The samples were collected between August 2024 and January 2026. From those samples, total testosterone levels were measured from 479 male, active-duty Army service members. (Those receiving testosterone treatment were excluded from the study—three men were excluded for this reason.) With some statistical weighting, the 479 included members were representative of the active-duty US Army personnel; the weighted mean age was about 30 years old, and the weighted mean body mass index (BMI) was 28.4, which falls in the “overweight” category.
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