The Dangers of Smoking During Pregnancy

Nowadays, everyone knows how bad a habit smoking is. Even under normal circumstances, smoking is quite harmful, and when used during pregnancy, it poses a great threat to the health of both the mother and the baby. The nicotine, tar, lead, carbon monoxide, and other toxic substances in cigarettes spread to all organs in the body, causing damaging effects primarily on the respiratory system, but also on the heart, blood vessels, and other systems. While a normal human body can tolerate these effects for a certain period, it is much more difficult for an expectant mother and her unborn baby to tolerate them.

What are the dangers of smoking during pregnancy?

If the expectant mother smokes, the abnormal effects will begin to manifest themselves quickly. This can happen even with just one cigarette. The more she smokes, the greater the harmful effects will be.

Smoking during pregnancy reduces the blood, oxygen, and nutrients the baby needs for growth. It also approximately doubles the risk of low birth weight. Furthermore, premature birth is another negative effect of smoking. Babies of expectant mothers who smoke throughout their pregnancy have a significantly higher risk of apnea and Sudden Infant Death Syndrome (SIDS). Placenta previa, or premature placental separation, is also more common in expectant mothers who smoke compared to those who do not.

If a mother smoked during pregnancy, even if the pregnancy proceeds without complications, it can lead to chronic conditions such as asthma in babies, in addition to sudden infant death syndrome. Furthermore, these babies tend to have lower school performance than their peers, and may exhibit learning disabilities, behavioral problems, and antisocial behavior.

Considering all of this, smoking during pregnancy is extremely harmful to both the mother and the baby's health. Even if the number of cigarettes smoked is reduced, the risk does not drop to zero unless you quit completely. Therefore, quitting smoking from the moment you decide to conceive and bringing your baby into the world healthy is the best thing to do.

Remember, when you quit smoking, your baby will quit too.

Stay healthy…

Sources

• American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists. Smoking and women's health. ACOG Educational Bulletin, number 240, September 1997.
• Ananth, Cande V., et al. Incidence of placental abruption in relation to cigarette smoking and hypertensive disorders during pregnancy: a meta-analysis of observational studies. Obstetrics & Gynecology, volume 93, number 4, April 1999, pages 622-628.
• Drews, Carolyn D., et al. The relationship between idiopathic mental retardation and maternal smoking during pregnancy. Pediatrics, volume 97, April 1996, pages 547-553. Hwang, Shih-Jen, et al. Association study of transforming growth factor alpha Taq1 polymorphism and oral clefts: indication of gene-environment interaction in a population-based sample of infants with birth defects. American Journal of Epidemiology, volume 141, number 7, 1995, pages 629-636.
• Moller, AM, and Tonnesen, H. Smoking cessation and pregnancy. Ugeskr Laeger, volume 161, number 36, September 6, 1999, pages 4985-4986.
  Ness, Roberta B., et al. Cocaine and tobacco use and the risk of spontaneous abortion. The New England Journal of Medicine, volume 340, number 5, February 4, 1999, pages 333-339.