* . *
  • About
  • Advertise
  • Privacy & Policy
  • Contact
Saturday, October 25, 2025
Earth-News
  • Home
  • Business
  • Entertainment
    CNN Launches New Show – What to Know About Host Elex Michaelson – Central Oregon Daily

    Get to Know Elex Michaelson: The Dynamic New Host Taking CNN by Storm

    Johnny Depp Set To Finally Make His Big Hollywood Comeback After Amber Heard Controversy – Yahoo

    Johnny Depp Set for a Triumphant Hollywood Comeback Following Amber Heard Controversy

    ‘Chainsaw Man — The Movie: Reze Arc’ Review: Hit Manga Gets an Ultra-Violent, Surprisingly Emotional Big-Screen Adaptation – Yahoo

    Chainsaw Man – The Movie: Reze Arc Review: A Brutal and Unexpectedly Emotional Big-Screen Adaptation

    Reba McEntire Details Personal Relationship With Late Stepson Brandon Blackstock – KNDU

    Reba McEntire Shares Emotional Tribute to Her Late Stepson Brandon Blackstock

    Sacramento city leaders approve adding 2 entertainment zones in midtown – CBS News

    Sacramento City Leaders Approve Two Thrilling New Entertainment Zones in Midtown

    AMC brings first new Dolby Experience to Gwinnett since 2017 – Wyoming News Now

    AMC Launches First New Dolby Experience in Gwinnett Since 2017

  • General
  • Health
  • News

    Cracking the Code: Why China’s Economic Challenges Aren’t Shaking Markets, Unlike America’s” – Bloomberg

    Trump’s Narrow Window to Spread the Truth About Harris

    Trump’s Narrow Window to Spread the Truth About Harris

    Israel-Gaza war live updates: Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh assassinated in Iran, group says

    Israel-Gaza war live updates: Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh assassinated in Iran, group says

    PAP Boss to Niger Delta Youths, Stay Away from the Protest

    PAP Boss to Niger Delta Youths, Stay Away from the Protest

    Court Restricts Protests In Lagos To Freedom, Peace Park

    Court Restricts Protests In Lagos To Freedom, Peace Park

    Fans React to Jazz Jennings’ Inspiring Weight Loss Journey

    Fans React to Jazz Jennings’ Inspiring Weight Loss Journey

    Trending Tags

    • Trump Inauguration
    • United Stated
    • White House
    • Market Stories
    • Election Results
  • Science
  • Sports
  • Technology
    Ghost Tapping is exploiting tap-to-pay technology in order to steal your money; what your need to know – ABC7 New York

    Ghost Tapping: How Thieves Are Using Tap-to-Pay Technology to Steal Your Money and What You Need to Know

    New technology for grading and packing dates – FreshPlaza

    Revolutionary Technology Transforms Date Grading and Packing Process

    Project underway to upgrade technology on 911 towers in Kanawha County – WCHS

    Kanawha County Launches Major Upgrade to 911 Tower Technology

    Next steps: Technology opens new options for greater mobility – Missouri Independent

    Next Steps: How Technology is Opening Exciting New Doors to Greater Mobility

    Rydberg Technologies Inc. Announces Launch of Rydberg Photonics in Berlin – The Quantum Insider

    Rydberg Technologies Launches Exciting New Photonics Division in Berlin

    A look into new technology at Columbia University that could help prevent a dangerous pregnancy complication – ABC7 New York

    A look into new technology at Columbia University that could help prevent a dangerous pregnancy complication – ABC7 New York

    Trending Tags

    • Nintendo Switch
    • CES 2017
    • Playstation 4 Pro
    • Mark Zuckerberg
No Result
View All Result
  • Home
  • Business
  • Entertainment
    CNN Launches New Show – What to Know About Host Elex Michaelson – Central Oregon Daily

    Get to Know Elex Michaelson: The Dynamic New Host Taking CNN by Storm

    Johnny Depp Set To Finally Make His Big Hollywood Comeback After Amber Heard Controversy – Yahoo

    Johnny Depp Set for a Triumphant Hollywood Comeback Following Amber Heard Controversy

    ‘Chainsaw Man — The Movie: Reze Arc’ Review: Hit Manga Gets an Ultra-Violent, Surprisingly Emotional Big-Screen Adaptation – Yahoo

    Chainsaw Man – The Movie: Reze Arc Review: A Brutal and Unexpectedly Emotional Big-Screen Adaptation

    Reba McEntire Details Personal Relationship With Late Stepson Brandon Blackstock – KNDU

    Reba McEntire Shares Emotional Tribute to Her Late Stepson Brandon Blackstock

    Sacramento city leaders approve adding 2 entertainment zones in midtown – CBS News

    Sacramento City Leaders Approve Two Thrilling New Entertainment Zones in Midtown

    AMC brings first new Dolby Experience to Gwinnett since 2017 – Wyoming News Now

    AMC Launches First New Dolby Experience in Gwinnett Since 2017

  • General
  • Health
  • News

    Cracking the Code: Why China’s Economic Challenges Aren’t Shaking Markets, Unlike America’s” – Bloomberg

    Trump’s Narrow Window to Spread the Truth About Harris

    Trump’s Narrow Window to Spread the Truth About Harris

    Israel-Gaza war live updates: Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh assassinated in Iran, group says

    Israel-Gaza war live updates: Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh assassinated in Iran, group says

    PAP Boss to Niger Delta Youths, Stay Away from the Protest

    PAP Boss to Niger Delta Youths, Stay Away from the Protest

    Court Restricts Protests In Lagos To Freedom, Peace Park

    Court Restricts Protests In Lagos To Freedom, Peace Park

    Fans React to Jazz Jennings’ Inspiring Weight Loss Journey

    Fans React to Jazz Jennings’ Inspiring Weight Loss Journey

    Trending Tags

    • Trump Inauguration
    • United Stated
    • White House
    • Market Stories
    • Election Results
  • Science
  • Sports
  • Technology
    Ghost Tapping is exploiting tap-to-pay technology in order to steal your money; what your need to know – ABC7 New York

    Ghost Tapping: How Thieves Are Using Tap-to-Pay Technology to Steal Your Money and What You Need to Know

    New technology for grading and packing dates – FreshPlaza

    Revolutionary Technology Transforms Date Grading and Packing Process

    Project underway to upgrade technology on 911 towers in Kanawha County – WCHS

    Kanawha County Launches Major Upgrade to 911 Tower Technology

    Next steps: Technology opens new options for greater mobility – Missouri Independent

    Next Steps: How Technology is Opening Exciting New Doors to Greater Mobility

    Rydberg Technologies Inc. Announces Launch of Rydberg Photonics in Berlin – The Quantum Insider

    Rydberg Technologies Launches Exciting New Photonics Division in Berlin

    A look into new technology at Columbia University that could help prevent a dangerous pregnancy complication – ABC7 New York

    A look into new technology at Columbia University that could help prevent a dangerous pregnancy complication – ABC7 New York

    Trending Tags

    • Nintendo Switch
    • CES 2017
    • Playstation 4 Pro
    • Mark Zuckerberg
No Result
View All Result
Earth-News
No Result
View All Result
Home Health

A lot of children are about to be born in Ukraine. Will the war affect them for life?

April 26, 2024
in Health
A lot of children are about to be born in Ukraine. Will the war affect them for life?
Share on FacebookShare on Twitter

When Russia attacked Ukraine in late February, Ukrainian civilians were immediately caught in the crossfire. Over the last month, people have been fleeing to neighboring countries, waiting out the nights in bomb shelters, and getting by without running water or electricity.

Pregnant people are among those caught in the middle. Some of the most horrific images from the war so far have come from a maternity hospital in Mariupol that was bombed by Russian troops in mid-March. The upheaval spurs a troubling question: Could the stress and condition of war affect a fetus in the womb?

Research suggests that the answer is possibly, yes. Certain factors, like the nutrition and mental health of a pregnant parent, can potentially influence the development and eventual health of their child, a concept known as fetal programming.

“It’s basically thinking about what happens during the 9 months of pregnancy that can help program, and help determine, the lifelong health of the offspring,” says Karen Lindsay, an assistant professor of pediatrics in the College of Health Sciences and researcher who specializes in maternal nutrition in pregnancy at the University of California, Irvine. “And that can be in a positive or a more negative direction.”

Fetal programming is difficult to study directly – researchers don’t subject pregnant people to extreme stress or malnourishment on purpose to see what happens – so there is a lot scientists do not know about what is really going on in the bodies of pregnant parents and their offspring.

In the research we do have, elevated levels of stress during pregnancy have been linked to increased risk for conditions like ADHD and depression. Malnourishment has been linked to a host of developmental issues, as well as heart disease and diabetes later in life. For parents, this is cause for concern. But nothing is set in stone, says Vivette Glover, professor of perinatal psychobiology at Imperial College London. While children may be born with a higher risk for developing certain conditions, it is far from guaranteed that they actually will. What’s more, parents can take steps to reduce these risks further after a child is born.

Malnourishment during pregnancy can impact a child throughout their life. “Our research over the last 70 years or so has shown that those babies who are maybe malnourished during fetal development and born small, they actually have an increased risk of obesity and heart disease later in life,” Lindsay says.

This seems counterintuitive, she says, and researchers theorize that after being in starvation mode during development, the child’s body tries to catch up and ends up overcompensating for the lack of nutrients during early life. Those starvation signals “may program the offspring to be more susceptible to storing fat throughout life, rather than lean muscle mass,” Lindsay says. This in turn might increase a child’s chance of developing obesity. 

Not getting enough nutrients may also impair the development of the pancreas, which could put the child at risk of developing type 2 diabetes later in life, says Jessian Muñoz, MD, a maternal-fetal medicine fellow at UT Health San Antonio. If the pregnant parent develops diabetes during pregnancy (which happens in about 2 % to 10% of pregnancies in the U.S. every year), it could change the way the fetus responds to certain hormones and sugars, potentially setting the child up to develop diabetes later, he says.

It is important to note many of these findings are based largely on studies that look backward, perhaps at a specific event like a famine or that trace health over decades, and on research conducted on animals like mice and rats. With animal and retrospective studies, scientists can’t conclusively say that malnourishment during pregnancy in humans leads directly to conditions like obesity, heart disease, or diabetes, only that they see a connection.

Proper nutrition is also critical for the physical development of all the baby’s organs in the womb. The micronutrient folate, for instance, has been shown to be critically important for preventing neural tube defects, which are serious defects of the brain and spine and can lead to death or severe disability, Lindsay says. That’s why people who are pregnant or trying to get pregnant are instructed to take folic acid, she says.

Similarly, the micronutrients iodine and choline are critical for fetal brain development and preventing fetal hyperthyroidism, which can affect the baby’s health from birth, Lindsay says. And long-chain omega-3 fatty acids, often found in oily fish, are important for the development of the brain and eyes, she says. 

Research also suggests the mental health of the pregnant parent can influence a child’s development, and increase their risk for developing mental health issues later in life.

Scientists have looked specifically at the effects of stress from major disasters or conflicts on pregnant parents and their babies. For example, an analysis of seven natural disasters, including the 2011 Queensland Flood in Australia, the 1998 Quebec Ice Storm in Canada, and the 2010 earthquake in Haiti, found experiencing these events was linked, perhaps not surprisingly, to higher rates of stress in pregnant people. This stress in turn was associated with certain physical and mental development outcomes for their babies, including higher BMI and worse cognitive and behavioral outcomes after birth. Another study found people exposed as fetuses or early childhood to the Chinese Famine between 1959 and 1961 were at higher risk for cognitive decline in adulthood.

Glover, the professor in London, and her colleagues have looked specifically at the impacts of stress during pregnancy on brain development. While the researchers don’t know exactly what’s happening in the pregnant parent’s body, they believe cortisol, the hormone responsible for the body’s stress response, is crucially important. “We think that the fetus being exposed to more cortisol in the womb is one of the things that changes the development of the brain,” making the child more likely to develop anxiety and emotional, behavioral, and cognitive problems, Glover says.

There’s an enzyme responsible for breaking down cortisol, reducing levels of the stress hormone in the body. But stressed out pregnant rats and really anxious pregnant people both seem to have lower levels of this enzyme in their placenta, the organ that acts as a filter between parent and fetus. This could mean more of the parent’s cortisol actually reaches, and can affect, the fetus. In this way, Glover and her colleagues also think stress works in tandem with individual genetic vulnerabilities. “We all have different genetic vulnerabilities; if a mother is stressed while pregnant and the child has a genetic vulnerability to ADHD, say, then they’re more likely to get it,” Glover says. High levels of cortisol in the pregnant parent could also influence the development of other organs, like the kidneys, which could put the baby at higher risk for high blood pressure and other conditions, Muñoz says.

Stress and nutrition are related, Lindsay says. Not only can feeling stressed influence what people eat, but stress may also affect how their bodies metabolize certain foods, she says. A pregnant person might eat a meal they think is healthy, but because they are eating while feeling stressed instead of calm, the healthy meal could potentially boost their blood sugar level higher than expected. This in turn could influence how the fetus receives nutrition from the parent, she says.

Scientists also think some of the effects from stress and nutrition could be happening at the molecular level, inside a child’s DNA. Factors like anxiety or malnourishment could influence the chemicals that determine whether or not certain genes are switched on or off, Glover says. While there’s a lot of research interest around this idea, the evidence is still fairly sparse. “I wouldn’t say the epigenetic evidence is the strongest, by a long way,” Glover added.

Only a small percentage of children are impacted by high stress during pregnancy in this way, says Glover of her research. In one study, for example, 12% of the children born to the most anxious or depressed parents (ranking in the top 15% of all the parents surveyed) had double the risk of a probable mental disorder at age 13. In contrast, only about 6% of the children born to the remaining parents had a similar risk. “We’re talking about increasing risk and it really matters … but most children aren’t affected.”

For many people, it may be impossible to avoid stress during pregnancy, whether that stress is from work and daily life, an ongoing mental health condition like depression or anxiety, or from a geopolitical conflict, like the war in Ukraine. What’s more, not all parents have access to highly nutritious foods; perhaps they live in a food desert or are just struggling to survive. This isn’t the fault of the pregnant person, Glover says. “We must support them as a society,” she says.

The good news is, research indicates many of the effects of stress during pregnancy can be reduced after birth, Glover says. Paying special attention to these children, ensuring they feel securely attached to their parents or caregivers, and breastfeeding can all help mitigate the impacts of stress, she says.

The same holds true when it comes to malnourishment, Lindsay says. A child’s susceptibility to a condition like diabetes could be alleviated with proper nutrition, activity, and other interventions, she says. A susceptibility is not an inevitability (That said, some physical defects, like neural tube defects, cannot be rectified later).

In Ukraine, the shelling around major cities like Kyiv continues and people live life on high alert. In Mariupol, families who can’t escape the artillery are running out of food and water. “The stress going on in Ukraine must be tremendous,” Glover says. While it’s impossible to say exactly how the war will impact children born during the Russian invasion, past disasters have shown the effects could be lifelong, perhaps manifesting as early mental decline, depression, or increased risk for heart disease. Glover says it will be crucially important to take care of these children after birth, in any way possible.

>>> Read full article>>>
Copyright for syndicated content belongs to the linked Source : WebMD – https://www.webmd.com/children/features/fetal-programming-ukraine?src=RSS_PUBLIC

Tags: ChildrenhealthUkraine
Previous Post

Get the Care You Need in a COVID-19 World

Next Post

What Trans Health Care for Minors Really Means

Nutritional supplements boost baby coral survival – EurekAlert!

How Nutritional Supplements Are Boosting Baby Coral Survival Rates

October 25, 2025
Scientists Are One Step Closer to Letting Humans ‘Breathe’ Through Their Butts – Yahoo

Scientists Are One Step Closer to Letting Humans ‘Breathe’ Through Their Butts – Yahoo

October 25, 2025
Bizarre Crystals in Titan’s Lakes Could Break a Fundamental Rule of Chemistry – ScienceAlert

Strange Crystals Found in Titan’s Lakes Challenge a Fundamental Chemistry Rule

October 25, 2025
Mortgage Rates Inch Toward 6% as Fed Weighs October Cut – IslanderNews.com

Mortgage Rates Surge Near 6% Amid Speculation of October Fed Rate Cut

October 25, 2025
Ghost Tapping is exploiting tap-to-pay technology in order to steal your money; what your need to know – ABC7 New York

Ghost Tapping: How Thieves Are Using Tap-to-Pay Technology to Steal Your Money and What You Need to Know

October 25, 2025
This Week in Sports Trivia: October 23, 2025 – The Athletic – The New York Times

Think You’re a Sports Expert? Take on This Week’s October 23, 2025 Trivia Challenge!

October 25, 2025
How to watch the 2025 MLB World Series: Dodgers vs. Blue Jays game schedule, channels, streaming, when is Shohei Ohtani starting and more – Yahoo Sports

Ultimate Guide to Watching the 2025 MLB World Series: Dodgers vs. Blue Jays Game Schedule, Channels, Streaming, and Shohei Ohtani’s Start Time

October 24, 2025
A circular economy approach for the global lithium-ion battery supply chain – Nature

Revolutionizing the Global Lithium-Ion Battery Supply Chain Through a Circular Economy Approach

October 24, 2025
CNN Launches New Show – What to Know About Host Elex Michaelson – Central Oregon Daily

Get to Know Elex Michaelson: The Dynamic New Host Taking CNN by Storm

October 24, 2025
Idaho Medicaid mental health contractor to cut doctor pay rates by 4%-15% – Idaho Capital Sun

Idaho Medicaid Mental Health Contractor to Cut Doctor Pay Rates by Up to 15%

October 24, 2025

Categories

Archives

October 2025
M T W T F S S
 12345
6789101112
13141516171819
20212223242526
2728293031  
« Sep    
Earth-News.info

The Earth News is an independent English-language daily published Website from all around the World News

Browse by Category

  • Business (20,132)
  • Ecology (885)
  • Economy (906)
  • Entertainment (21,777)
  • General (17,790)
  • Health (9,947)
  • Lifestyle (919)
  • News (22,149)
  • People (907)
  • Politics (916)
  • Science (16,117)
  • Sports (21,406)
  • Technology (15,886)
  • World (889)

Recent News

Nutritional supplements boost baby coral survival – EurekAlert!

How Nutritional Supplements Are Boosting Baby Coral Survival Rates

October 25, 2025
Scientists Are One Step Closer to Letting Humans ‘Breathe’ Through Their Butts – Yahoo

Scientists Are One Step Closer to Letting Humans ‘Breathe’ Through Their Butts – Yahoo

October 25, 2025
  • About
  • Advertise
  • Privacy & Policy
  • Contact

© 2023 earth-news.info

No Result
View All Result

© 2023 earth-news.info

No Result
View All Result

© 2023 earth-news.info

Go to mobile version