Most people know that smoking during pregnancy is a bad idea. The CDC warns that smoking during pregnancy can increase the likelihood of a miscarriage, Sudden Infant Death Syndrome (SIDS), and certain birth defects like a cleft lip or palate, and premature birth.
New research, published in the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA) Psychiatry in July, is adding “conduct disorders” to that list of health risks. Mothers who smoked during pregnancy were more likely to have children who had behavioral issues, the study found.
“The evidence is emerging that smoking in pregnancy and the frequency of smoking in pregnancy is correlated with developmental outcomes after (children) are born,” senior author Gordon Harold, professor of developmental psychopathology at the University of Leicester in England, said.
The CDC estimates that 13 percent of women smoked during their last three months of pregnancy. A 2012 survey conducted by the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA) showed that an even higher amount, 21.8 percent of white women aged 15 to 44, smoked while pregnant. Black and Hispanic women’s rates lingered around 14.2 and 6.5 percent respectively.
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