'Shocking results'
Nicola Heslehurst, Professor of Maternal and Child Nutrition at Newcastle University, said, "We know how important it is for pregnant women to eat a nutritious and well-balanced diet for their own health and that of their developing baby.
"But when pregnant women experience food insecurity, it affects the quality of their diet because they can't afford increasingly expensive items such as fruit and vegetables, and, therefore, have to rely on cheaper poor nutritional quality foods.
"While we were expecting to see some health risks during pregnancy, the extent of those we found were quite shocking, especially for mental health, obesity, and pregnancy diabetes. These also have long-term implications, such as moms and their children being more likely to develop type 2 diabetes later in life."
Before COVID, fewer than one in 10 households in the UK were experiencing food insecurity. Now it is estimated that a quarter of households with babies and young children are food insecure, and almost half of all households with three or more children.
When people are food insecure, they go hungry, skip meals, or don't eat all day. Families can also experience financial problems that impact on bills, rent and heating costs, which further squeezes the household budget available for food.
Professor Heslehurst added, "If we look at more data from the UK, where there is a lack of support available and rapidly rising rates of food insecurity, we might find the risks are worse than we currently think, and the need for support even greater."
Food insecurity during pregnancy in high-income countries, and maternal weight and diet: A systematic review and meta-analysis