Pregnancy: Diet Drinks May Result in Overweight Children

Share On Social!

Pregnant women who drink diet beverages on a regular basis during their pregnancy are more likely to have overweight babies by their first birthday, according to a new study, NBC Health reports.

For the study, Canadian researchers followed 3,000 women and their children and found that babies whose mothers drank diet drinks on a regular basis had a higher BMI z-scores that “were significantly higher than those of their counterparts.”

“To our knowledge, our results provide the first human evidence that artificial sweetener consumption during pregnancy may increase the risk of early childhood overweight,” wrote the authors of the study, which was led by Meghan Azad of the University of Manitoba in Canada.

Experts recommend pregnant women to add diet beverages to their off-limits list and drink water instead.