Entirely Supported By Tax-Deductible Contributions
Entirely Supported By Tax-Deductible Contributions
http://ash.org/
SECONDHAND SMOKE MORE DANGEROUS FOR OLDER WOMEN [07.11.1]
Read What Happens When They Get Pregnant
Secondhand smoke poses a much higher risk to the pregnancies of women over 30, according to a new study. It found:
* as many as 300,000 pregnancies may be adversely affected by secondhand smoke
* older pregnant women regularly exposed to secondhand smoke were about twice as likely to deliver a preterm baby
* they were almost 2 1/2 times more likely to have low birthweight babies
Here are two reports:
St. Louis Post-Dispatch: Older Pregnant Women Affected
Secondhand tobacco smoke poses a much greater risk to the pregnancies of nonsmoking women over 30 than it does for younger women, according to a study released Wednesday.
The study, in the July issue of American Journal of Epidemiology, said hundreds of thousands of pregnancies a year in the United States may be affected by secondhand smoke.
"Given the proportions of older women giving birth in the United States and adult exposure to ETS (environmental tobacco smoke), it is possible that upwards of 300,000 pregnancies among nonsmokers could be affected by ETS exposure, which has implications for the family and for the child's long-term growth and development," the study said.
The study was conducted by researchers at the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention who analyzed data collected from more than 17,000 low-income women in Arizona and North Dakota.
It found that nonsmoking women older than 30 who lived with a smoker had a much greater chance of delivering a premature or underweight baby than did nonsmokers of the same age group who lived in a smoke-free home.
MSNBC - Passive smoke worse for moms over 30
Pregnant women older than 30 have another reason to ban their smoking spouses from the house: A new study shows passive smoke poses a greater risk to newborns of older moms than to babies born to younger ones.
The findings suggest that upwards of 300,000 pregnancies among nonsmokers could be adversely affected by secondhand smoke, government researchers reported Wednesday.
In the study of almost 17,500 pregnant women, nonsmokers who were over 30 and regularly exposed to secondhand smoke by a household member were about twice as likely to deliver a preterm baby than older nonsmokers not regularly exposed to passive smoke, according to the researchers at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in Atlanta.
And they were almost 2 1/2 times more likely to have low birthweight babies, the researchers reported in the July issue of the American Journal of Epidemiology.
Both preterm and low birthweight infants are at a risk for a host of health ills, ranging from respiratory distress syndrome to kidney infections. And research suggests that premature babies are more likely to have long-term growth and development problems as well.
Environmental tobacco smoke may affect the unborn baby's health in any of several ways, possibly by restricting blood flow through fetus-nourishing placenta; which works less efficiently as one ages, said lead researcher Dr. Indu Ahluwalla of the division of nutrition and physical activity. Alternately, nicotine, carbon monoxide and other toxins generated by the burning cigarettes may directly retard fetal growth, Ahluwalla said.
The study, which analyzed data from low-income women who received care at publicly funded clinics in Arizona and North Dakota between 1989 and 1994, found that: Babies born to non-smoking women older than 30 who were exposed to passive smoke weighed 3.15 ounces less on average than babies born to women who lived in smoke-free homes. Babies born to nonsmokers 30 and younger weighed about the same regardless of whether household members smoked.
Likewise, the rate of premature births was about the same for nonsmokers 30 and younger, regardless of whether they were exposed to secondhand smoke. Among smokers, birth weights were lower in infants of both younger and older women exposed to secondhand smoke.
Although the analysis took into account education level, ethnicity and marital status, the researchers could not rule out the possibility that other economic and social factors might help explain the findings.
Still, the research has important public health implications, Ahluwalla said, with a recent study indicating that 37 percent of adults who do not smoke live in a household with at least one smoker or are exposed to passive smoke at work. And government statistics show that about 30 percent of births now occur among women age 30 and older, the CDC researcher noted.
| ACTION ON SMOKING AND HEALTH (ASH) 2013 H Street, NW / Washington, DC, 20006 / (202) 659-4310 A National Legal-Action Antismoking Organization NOW CELEBRATING 30 YEARS OF PUBLIC SERVICE All materials on ASH's main and supplemental web pages may be |