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Antidepressants in pregnancy do not raise children’s risk of autism or ADHD, study finds (www.theguardian.com)
submitted 6 months ago by to c/upliftingnews@lemmy.world
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James Walker, a professor emeritus of obstetrics and gynaecology at the University of Leeds, said the research had helped to “cut through the noise” regarding recent concerns regarding whether medications taken by mothers during pregnancy could affect their babies.

“The practical message is straightforward” Walker said. “Women with moderate or severe depression should not stop their antidepressants in pregnancy out of fear of causing autism or ADHD. Depression that goes untreated in pregnancy carries real risks of its own, for the mother, the pregnancy and for the developing baby, including a higher chance of premature birth, postnatal depression and difficulties bonding with the baby. For milder depression, talking therapies and other non-medication approaches are usually tried first, in line with current guidelines. As always, decisions in pregnancy are personal and should be made with a clinician who knows the woman’s history.”

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[–] 28 points 6 months ago (22 children)

Have we even found a single link between habits/conditions of pregnancy and ADHD/autism yet? I feel like every time I hear these stories, it’s a repeat of the last study’s findings.

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  • [–] 10 points 6 months ago (1 child)

    It's mainly genetic imo

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  • [–] 1 point 5 months ago

    honestly the idea of autism being caused by something seems fucking insane, it's like saying red hair is caused by smoking while pregnant, what the fuck

    like it's just kind of obscene ableism, isn't it? At least since people are constantly saying "causes" and "risk" as if having autism or ADHD is a terrible disease that we need to cure, rather than an inherent part of who you are that society has a moral obligation to accomodate.

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  • [–] 6 points 5 months ago

    A substantial body of evidence links maternal infection during pregnancy to adverse neurodevelopmental outcomes in offspring. Large national registry studies have reported increased risks of neuropsychiatric disease such as autism spectrum disorder, cognitive delay, schizophrenia, and mood disorders after in utero exposure to maternal infections.

    Links: https://journals.lww.com/greenjournal/fulltext/2026/01000/neurodevelopmental_outcomes_of_3_year_old_children.4.aspx

    https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/27287966/

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  • [–] 7 points 6 months ago (5 children)

    I want to see a modern study on cigerette smoking.

    When I was a kid (early 90s), my mom defended her decision to not stop smoking when she was pregnant with me, by quoting a study from the 1970s. They found it did not cause any ill effects.

    Well around 2005 I was poking around the internet, and found that yes, that study was reported exactly how she claimed, and was performed by the Nixon administration.

    It was also funded by Marlborrow. So take that study with a salt mine worth of salt.

    I want a new modern independant study done. Because my mom never stopped, and I have always felt like something is wrong with me, but I'm too dumb to put it into words. I'm not calling it autism, but it feels like there's a mental blockade preventing me from being me. I don't know how to explain it.

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  • [–] 7 points 6 months ago* (last edited 6 months ago)

    what study was that? i have a hunch that it said less than you think. by 1964 there was a surgeon general's report and meta-analysis that showed smoking had lots of ill effects on the smoker including "low birth weight" and the 1979 report and meta-analysis found "The more the mother smokes, the greater the baby's birth-weight reduction"

    check out https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK44697/table/ch5.t1

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  • [–] 11 points 6 months ago (3 children)
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  • [–] 2 points 5 months ago (2 children)

    I can't access this link but I may have been part of that study as a kid! My mother smoked almost all the way through her pregnancy with me and I went through a bunch of tests over about 10 years to see if it caused my allergies. I never got to see what the study actually said about it though.

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  • [–] 3 points 6 months ago (2 children)

    Cigarettes, alcohol, street drugs. Most other things are benign.

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  • [–] [S] 3 points 6 months ago

    It's pretty obvious that there's a hereditary component to ADHD/autism. But it's one of those things that needs further study to prove and since it's difficult to test these medications on pregnant women, it takes longer.

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  • [+] -4 points 6 months ago (4 children)
    [deleted]
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  • [–] [S] 1 point 6 months ago (2 children)

    There is a correlation, which is why the Trump administration was pushing the dangerous idea that pregnant women should not use acetaminophen because it will give their children autism. It's not a causation though.

    Pregnant women are limited to only acetaminophen for reducing fevers and treating pain.

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  • [+] -6 points 6 months ago (3 children)

    This one is a meta study based on other studies, so I guess that's to be expected.
    Everything is a fucking meta study today, and IMO they are too often shit, because they generally try to account for variables that the original studies weren't made for.
    Ah well, it's probably going to get worse, because now we will be overwhelmed by meta studies that are made by AI.

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  • [–] 11 points 6 months ago

    meta studies are the highest standard of evidence. when peer-reviewed, looking at old evidence in new lights is precisely what they're supposed to do, and there's no problem with that unless there's a response/refutal along those lines.

    i haven't seen them be at a higher frequency than usual either; in fact the latest data i could find shows it's slowed down since 2019: https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC11795965/figure/cesm70010-fig-0002/ (note that the data cutoff is May 2024)

    because now we will be overwhelmed by meta studies that are made by AI.

    Have we even found a single major-journal systematic review that was made by AI yet?

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  • [–] 7 points 6 months ago

    Do you even know what a meta study is? It is not just "this amount of research says this and this amount of research says that", the actually important and actual work that goes into a meta study is to point out weaknesses of the examined base studies to weigh their informative value on the meta study's topic.

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