ArticlePaediatric and perinatal epidemiology2025
Women exposed to famine in early gestation have increased mortality up to age 76 years.
Article in Paediatric and perinatal epidemiology, 2025. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 3 papers.
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3 citing papers in PubMed.
- Prenatal famine exposure restricts genetic effects on birth weight with implications for metabolic disease risk.Communications medicine · 2026Article
- Women exposed to famine in early gestation have increased mortality up to age 76 years.Paediatric and perinatal epidemiology · 2025Article
- A Life-Course Approach to Gestational Exposure to Famine and Risk of Mortality.Paediatric and perinatal epidemiology · 2025Article
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Abstract
backgroundWe have previously shown that exposure to famine in early gestation was associated with poorer adult health and, in women, with reduced survival up to age 64.
objectivesHere, we explore the association between prenatal famine exposure and mortality up to age 76 for men and women separately.
methodsWe studied adult mortality (>18 years) in men (n = 989) and women (n = 1002) born as term singletons around the time of the 1944-1945 Dutch famine. We compared overall and cause-specific mortality among men and women exposed to famine in late, mid, or early gestation to that among unexposed persons (born before or conceived after the famine) using Cox regression.
resultsIn total, 500 persons (25.1%) had died after age 18. Women exposed to famine in early gestation had higher overall (HR 1.49, 95% CI 1.00, 2.23), cancer (HR 2.17, 95% CI 1.32,3.58) and cardiovascular mortality (HR 2.33, 95% CI 0.91, 5.95) compared to unexposed women. Mortality rates among men were not different between exposure groups.
conclusionThis study showed that women, but not men, exposed to famine in early gestation had increased overall, cardiovascular and cancer mortality up to age 76. Although prenatal famine exposure affects adult health of both men and women, it seems to only lead to increased mortality among women.
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