Prenatal health and life outcomes: Unequal beginnings

[leokitten]

http://www.economist.com/news/inter...g-more-profoundly-shaped-influences-pregnancy

Could it be that problems in the prenatal environment lead to a higher likelihood of getting ME/CFS (and other immune disorders) later in life?

 

[leokitten]

A previously posted link to a paper proposing the same theory

http://forums.phoenixrising.me/inde...ult-including-developmental.7919/#post-154028

 

[SOC]

This article discusses disasters during pregnancy -- poverty, gross undernourishment, infections, badly polluted air, dirty water, binge drinking, exposure to the Chernobyl nuclear cloud. I think it's well-established that such events can cause long-term health problems in the developing fetus.

I doubt most PWME were exposed to such poor prenatal environments, so I doubt it's a significant factor in later development of ME. If we see increased incidence of ME in areas of extreme poverty, high alcoholism, and dirty water, then there might be reason to suggest such a correlation. However, since most of us here were not exposed to such things in utero and still developed ME, I think the correlation is likely to be small.

 

[leokitten]

I guess I read the article differently, to me the take home message is that we are learning that even small events during pregnancy can have serious lifelong effects on the child. As they stated:

Even relatively minor exposure can increase the odds of suffering from chronic disease or disability.

Just having a relative die during pregancy or fasting during the day (and eating at night) for one month will have lifelong negative effects on the child:

Less extreme events can also have long-term effects. A study from Sweden found that the children of women who had lost a relative while pregnant grew up to be more likely to suffer attention deficit disorder, anxiety or depression. Another, of Bangladeshi and Pakistani families in England, found that children whose first trimester in the womb coincided with Ramadan, when observant Muslims fast from sunrise to sunset, lagged behind educationally when they were seven—even though only some pregnant Muslims observe the fast. The negative effect on school performance was of similar size to the positive one associated with America’s Head Start, an early-years education programme.

And about Chernobyl, they discovered that the radiation exposure in Sweden was so small and considered completely harmless yet the children in the womb during this time had problems:

...were 40% more likely to fail in middle school than those born just before or after, even though they were exposed to radiation at doses now considered harmless, and their physical health did not seem to be affected.

I know here in the US we have no idea half the time what we've been exposed to, much more so back in the 60s and 70s as there was absolutely no awareness and little government oversight. I believe it's completely plausible that the developing immune system and brain are much more fragile and sensitive than previously thought during these "first 1000 days" as they describe and that a seemingly OK prenatal environment combining with genetic predisposition caused subtle immune abnormalities that don't really show up until later in life and then we get ME/CFS.