More than one in 10 French women smoke throughout their pregnancy despite the well-known health risks of doing so, according to new figures from Public Health France.
The survey of more than 1,300 mothers of children under five years old in 2021 found that 13 per cent of them smoked during the entirety of their pregnancy. This was similar to the results from the previous survey in 2017.
The recently released results show that "tobacco use is still very common" in both the adult population and during pregnancy, Public Health France said.
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Smoking while pregnant is linked to health problems for both women and newborns. According to France’s national health insurance, it raises the risk of adverse outcomes such as miscarriage, stillbirth, premature birth, and placental abruption.
A recent study also found that even light smoking (one or two cigarettes) before or during pregnancy could increase the risk of serious neonatal health complications.
The new Public Health France report showed that 24 per cent of mothers of children under five said they smoked cigarettes at the time that they learned of being pregnant.
Of them, 45 per cent said they stopped smoking after learning of their pregnancy or during it, while 51 per cent said they reduced how much they smoked. Of those surveyed, 4 per cent neither stopped nor reduced their smoking.
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The findings of the report echoed a separate Public Health France survey of 15,000 women that found that 12 per cent of them reported smoking in their third trimester of pregnancy in 2021.
That figure was an improvement, however, from the 16 per cent of women who said they still smoked during their third trimester in the previous 2016 survey.
Why are women smoking during pregnancy?
Caroline Combot, president of the French National Union Organisation of Midwives, told Euronews Health that it can be difficult to convince women who smoke to completely stop during pregnancy.
Those who do try to quit "will relapse very quickly," Combot said, adding that there is a "lack of communication about the difficulty of quitting smoking during pregnancy".
She added that there can also be a long wait to have a consultation with a smoking cessation specialist and without accompanying women, many will have a hard time stopping completely.
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It’s also up to the pregnant woman’s partner to stop smoking as having someone in the same household who smokes can make quitting much more difficult.
"Both parents must take steps to wean [themselves off of tobacco]," Combot said.
Yves Martinet, president of the French National Committee against Smoking, added that the results did not come as a surprise.
"It's a real French scandal because the care of these young women concerning their smoking is mediocre in France when it should be systematic," he told Euronews Health, adding that this should happen before even considering pregnancy.
The Public Health France report also looked at survey data for alcohol consumption during pregnancy and found that 7 per cent of women with young children said they drank alcohol during their last pregnancy.
This was an improvement compared to the 2017 survey data.
Combot says that many women who consume alcohol are not addicted to it, unlike cigarette smoking.
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In a statement, Public Health France said that it was important to "continue prevention efforts and support women struggling with substance use during pregnancy".
"The number of women and children concerned is far from being anecdotal," the agency added, pointing out that often the surveys underestimated the real number of people who smoke and drink during pregnancy.
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