Maternal smoking during pregnancy increases the risk of overweight in children before the age of eight years, according to a new study by Dr Aimin Chen and colleagues at the US National Institutes of Health.
Using data for 34,866 children enrolled in the US Collaborative Perinatal Project, the researchers examined maternal pregnancy smoking in relation to weight, height and body mass index (BMI) in offspring at ages one, three, four, seven and eight years.
Although children of mothers who smoked during pregnancy were found to weigh less at birth, their weight quickly equalled or exceeded that of other children. In the period up to eight years old, the children of smokers were more likely to be overweight, particularly the girls. Maternal smoking in the third trimester of pregnancy was more strongly associated with child overweight than maternal smoking in the first trimester.
Dr Chen said: "Lower birth weight among infants of prenatal smokers results in greater post-natal catch-up growth which is associated with increased risk of diabetes, hypertension, and cardiovascular diseases.
"In addition, maternal smoking during pregnancy may be associated with poor appetite control in offspring. Just as adults who stop smoking can experience weight gain, babies who experience withdrawal from in utero smoking exposure after birth may also be susceptible to increased weight gain."
Aimin Chen, Michael L Pennell, Mark A Klebanoff, Walter J Rogan and Matthew P Longnecker: Maternal smoking during pregnancy in relation to child overweight: follow-up to age 8 years Int J Epidemiol., doi: 10.1093/ije/dyi218
3. Tackling obesity in the developing world
Obesity will continue to spread in the developing world where governments and health services have few effective public health levers with which to arrest the trend, writes Andrew Prentice of the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine.
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Contact: Hannah Johnson
hannah.johnson@bristol.ac.uk
44-117-928-8896
University of Bristol
1-Feb-2006