If you're a new parent or planning to be one, this one's for you, especially mothers. During World War II, there was a sugar ration in the UK, which ended in 1953, after which point sugar consumption pretty much doubled across the board, while fat protein and produce consumption stayed pretty much the same, which created what us scientists love, which is a perfect natural experiment. They found that limiting the sugar consumption in the first thousand days of life and in utero lowered the later on risk of diabetes and hypertension. whopping 35% and 20%, also a lowered risk of obesity. And one third of that risk reduction was based on what the mother ate while she was pregnant. Now, this type of study doesn't show exactly why the risk reduction occurred, but it could be due to epigenetic changes during the child's development, which either impacts how their body processes, blood sugar, insulin, calories, all that sort of stuff, or maybe even modifies how they approach their dietary cravings throughout the rest of their life. And it's not like this is anything crazy, because The current dietary guidelines are from added sugars in its under two years to zero. Fruit is fine, but don't be pouring in the added sugar. Certain things are not part of your food breakfast. And later on in life, it becomes more about money.
Additional notes
One of thr big challenges within scientific literature is how hard it is to study children and pregnant mothers—we understandably don’t like using them as test subjects. Which makes this type of natural experiment extra useful! #science #health #nutrition #parents #stem #Edutok #learnontiktok
References
No DOI, PMID, or source link was listed in the spreadsheet caption. The transcript references a UK sugar-rationing natural experiment, but the workbook row does not include a direct source URL.