The title of this article could suggest that, as for everything related to tobacco and pregnancy, we speak of an increased risk. But I was surprised to learn that the smoking during pregnancy is associated with a lower risk of preeclampsia.
Go ahead that the innumerable and serious risks of smoking while pregnant are much worse than this supposed "prevention" effect.
The risk of abortion, cleft lip, hyperactivity, behavioral problems, low birth weight, strabismus ... are just some of the harmful effects of tobacco during pregnancy.
But there seems to be evidence that now confirms a new study that states that women who smoke during pregnancy would have a lower risk of preeclampsia.
Research is continuing in this direction, not to "defend" a positive effect of tobacco, but because understanding how to prevent such a disorder would help explain it and find new treatments or for prevention.
Remember that preeclampsia or toxemia gravidarumIt is a disease of pregnancy that generates high blood pressure, edema (fluid retention) along with proteins in the urine usually after 20 weeks of gestation, at the time of delivery or even after birth.
The study was conducted by a team of researchers from the Carolina Institute in Stockholm, and published in "Hypertension" of the American Heart Association.
It was found among more than 600,000 women in Sweden who had had a baby between 1999 and 2006, that those who had smoked during pregnancy were a third or half less likely to develop preeclampsia than non-smokers. This "protective" effect was not recorded in users of a smokeless tobacco common in Sweden.
Since cigarette and smokeless tobacco contain nicotine, the results suggest that nicotine does not influence the reduction of the risk of preeclampsia. Instead, a derivative of burned tobacco (perhaps carbon monoxide) would.
The explanation could be that carbon monoxide reduces the levels of certain proteins that increase weeks before the onset of preeclampsia.
In any case, it is clear that smoking carries many worrisome risks to the fetus, so it is relationship between tobacco and the lowest risk of preeclampsia during pregnancy It should not in any case serve as an excuse to harm one's own health and that of the baby.
