Smoking in pregnancy could lead to 2 out of 3 overweight children by 2050, study says

Mothers who smoke during pregnancy put their children at a higher risk of obesity in their teens, a study reveals. The other factors include skipping breakfast and insufficient sleep.   

Children born to smoking moms are more likely to gain excessive weight as young children and teenagers, the researchers warn.

The common supposition is that genetic factors determine the level of obesity in children but investigators at University College London have opposed the common assumption: they maintain that weight is not all in the genes.

Health Newsline writes that The British researchers discovered that smoking during pregnancy, avoiding breakfast, and insufficient sleep all contribute to obesity and overweight.

They maintain that early lifestyle modification and on-time intervention in incorrect habits can help restricting obesity and overgrowth in childhood.

The fears are intact that smoking causes indirect structural variations in the developing brain of an unborn baby that later generates a craving for fatty foods.

Daily Mail reports that the effects of smoking in long-term appear to be in the form of obesity but in short term, the effects of a mother's smoking on an unborn child are premature delivery, low birth weight, and physical deformities.

Dr. Amirreza Haghighi, of the Hospital for Sick Children, Toronto, Canada, supervised another study and said, 'Prenatal exposure to maternal cigarette smoking is a well-established risk factor for obesity, but the underlying mechanisms are not known.'

He further added, 'Preference for fatty foods, regulated in part by the brain reward system, may contribute to the development of obesity.'

The experts predict on the based of study findings that 2 out of every 3 children could be suffering from obesity by 2050 if current habits continue. At present 1 out of every 5 is obese. This obesity is threatening the children at a very young age!

The study was run on 378 recruited teenagers aging from 13 to 19 years. Half of these children had mothers who smoked.