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New Study Shows That Women Who Smoke Marijuana During Pregnancy Are More Likely To Have A Child With Autism

Roommates, according to new reports conducted in largest study ever done, health researchers recently found that using marijuana while pregnant may increase the risk that a child will develop autism. While there has been research on this issue for several years, this one is the closest experts have come to directly linking marijuana usage while pregnant to autism in children.

Health study author, author Dr. Darine El-Chaâr, a maternal fetal medicine specialist and clinical investigator at Ottawa Hospital Research Institute in Canada, stated that “Women who used cannabis during pregnancy were 1.5 times more likely to have a child with autism.” “These are not reassuring findings. We highly discourage use of cannabis during pregnancy and breastfeeding,” she added.

Previous studies have shown the use of marijuana during pregnancy is linked to low birth weight, impulsivity, hyperactivity, attention issues and other cognitive and behavioral issue in children, according to the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Additionally, one study also discovered that pregnant women who use marijuana, also have a 2.3 times greater risk of stillbirth.

The study, published on August 10th in the journal “Nature,” reviewed data from every birth in Ontario, Canada, between 2007 and 2012, well before recreational marijuana was legalized in Canada in 2017. Of the half a million women in that data pool, researchers then narrowed the study to 2,200 women who said they used only marijuana during pregnancy, without mixing it with tobacco, alcohol or opioids.

 

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Danielle Jennings