HHS HealthBeat (September 04, 2007)

Moms smoke - babies don’t sleep

From the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, I’m Ira Dreyfuss with HHS HealthBeat.

New moms get scant rest, and smokers may get less. Julie Mennella of the Monell Chemical Senses Center in Philadelphia found that in a study of breastfed infants.

For the study, which was supported by the National Institutes of Health, researchers monitored breastfed babies’ sleep for 3 and one half hours on two days. One day, their mothers smoked beforehand; the other, they didn’t. Mennella’s results are in the journal Pediatrics.

"We found that, on the day that infants breastfed from their mothers after they had smoked, the babies spent less time sleeping and they woke up from their naps sooner." (8 seconds)

Babies napped a half hour less when moms smoked, sleeping for 53 minutes.

This could be because chemicals such as nicotine were passed through the milk, which also ends up tasting like tobacco.

Learn more at hhs.gov.

HHS HealthBeat is a production of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. I’m Ira Dreyfuss.

Last revised: September, 04 2007