ACCORDING TO reports published in the medical journal, The Lancet, a group of American scientists have said that adding pounds during pregnancy has adverse effects on the yet to be born baby. Earlier, in studies which were conducted on the same topic, scientists were not able to detect the link between a mother's weight gain and the baby's health. However, the latest study found that the actual excess weight of the mother is having a direct effect on the growing foetus.
The studies which were carried out this year comprised a team of researchers from Boston Children's Hospital and Columbia University, in New York. The exercise was conducted on a group of women, who had conceived twice and found out that for every kilogram that a mother gains the weight of the baby increases by seven grams. The study included more than 5,00,000 women, all of whom had conceived twice.
It was also found that women, who had put on 24 kilograms at the time of pregnancy had, on an average heavier babies than the women who gained weight between eight to ten kilograms. It was concluded that the heavier the baby at birth will have greater obesity related problems for the rest of his life. Meanwhile, women who gained 24 kilograms were twice as likely to have a baby that weighed more than 4 kilograms at the time of birth.
The research, which was led by authors Dr David Ludwig and Dr Janet Currie said “Because high birth weight predicts body mass index later in life, these findings suggest that excessive weight gain during pregnancy could raise the long-term risk of obesity-related disease in offspring. "High birth weight might also increase risk of other diseases later in life, including asthma, atopy, and cancer.”
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