High temperatures during pregnancy can be dangerous for baby girls

The National Institute of Health and Medical Research, the University of Grenoble Alpes and the CNRS have published a study on the impact of outside temperatures on babies. The researchers studied the period of pregnancy and a troubling element emerged: baby girls can have sequelae because of very high or very low temperatures that occurred during pregnancy. They took into account specific parameters on the outside temperatures: very low, it is below 1° and high above 24°. They did their research out of 343 women, from conception until the baby is 6-7 weeks old.

Baby girls can therefore have sequelae when during pregnancy it is very hot or very cold. The consequences are localized at the level of breathing for little girls, while baby boys have absolutely nothing. A situation therefore worrying given the context, global warming could not help to the respiratory problems of little girls even if, for the moment, the long-term effects have not yet been studied.

It shows the importance of protecting pregnant women from heat

One of the study’s authors, Johanna Lepeule, detailed which lung alterations were involved: “The variations observed are not of a pathological nature and do not make it possible to predict a respiratory disorder thereafter, but the various measurements of pulmonary function carried out all converge towards an association in the little girl between exposure in utero to high or low temperatures and poorer pulmonary performance in the newborn. born” Even if many parameters remain to be defined, the researchers have already planned to do the same analyzes over 3 to 8 years to find out more about his respiratory problems. But for Johanna Lepeule the message is clear: “These results underpin the importance of developing public policies to protect pregnant women and their children from extreme temperatures, especially in the current context of global warming.”