Drug study: Recreational drug use by young women has been linked for the first time to a particularly severe form of abnormality in newborn babies.
A study by a professor of obstetrics and gynaecology at Galway's University College Hospital and the National University of Ireland in Galway, Prof John Morrison, has found that 20 per cent of cases of foetal gastroschisis are linked to recreational drug use at the time of the baby's conception or in early pregnancy.
Foetal gastroschisis is a condition whereby the baby is born with its abdominal wall open and the intestines and internal organs are all outside the body. The baby subsequently requires significant surgery.
Traditionally it is said to occur in approximately one in every 10,000 live births, but over the past decade its incidence in many countries appears to be increasing.
While Prof Morrison's study was conducted in the UK, he said there was no reason to believe the results would be any different if the study was conducted in the Republic.
He added that while there were no actual up-to-date figures for the number of children born in the State with foetal gastroschisis every year, obstetricians here were "observing" an increasing incidence of the condition, predominantly among teenage mothers and in women in their early 20s.
His latest research, published in the British Journal of Obstetrics and Gynaecology, was carried out over a number of years at University College London Hospital.There were 47 pregnant women included in the study of which 22 had children with foetal gastroschisis and 25 who had a normal foetus.
By the time they were studied the women were already several months pregnant but a new technology for measuring drug compounds in the women's hair was used to determine if they took ecstasy or cocaine in early pregnancy.
Prof Morrison said the study confirmed scientifically the suspected association between intake of recreational drugs around the time of conception and potential malformations in the baby, which may include much more than the condition of gastroschisis.
"In an era where intake of recreational drugs has become more prevalent in younger mothers, dissemination of this information is an important public health message," he said.