2023-09-28 12:46:01
The risk of miscarriage or stillbirth can be doubled in women who have lost their job. This is confirmed by research published in ‘Human Reproduction‘ which, however, cannot prove that losing a job causes pregnancy loss.
The researchers, led by Selin Köksal of the Institute for Social and Economic Research at the University of Essex (United Kingdom), acknowledge that to establish this relationship, more research would be needed to understand whether losing a job actually causes an increased risk of pregnancy loss.
For Köksal, “these data can help clarify whether there are strong causal links between job loss and pregnancy loss, and whether there are certain socioeconomic groups in the population that are particularly at risk, such as economically precarious employees.”
The researchers write that being able to examine the association between job loss and pregnancy loss among different socioeconomic groups could help us understand how exactly job loss is related to an increased risk of miscarriage or stillbirth. «Is it due to economic difficulties, the experience of an unexpected event or the loss of social status? “These are the questions we hope to answer in the future.”
The study is based on survey data «Understanding Society« from 40,000 households in the United Kingdom between 2009 and 2022. Includes 8,142 pregnancies for which there was complete information on the date of conception and pregnancy outcome.
Of these pregnancies, 11.6% had spontaneous abortions (947), which may be an underestimate because many pregnancies do not survive beyond the first month and the pregnancy loss may go unnoticed. There were 38 stillbirths, representing 0.5% of conceptions, which is consistent with official UK statistics on stillbirths.
Of 136 women affected by the loss of their job or partner, 32 (23.5%) suffered a spontaneous abortion and one (0.7%) was stillborn. Among 8,006 women who were not affected by their own or their partner’s job loss, 915 (10.4%) suffered a miscarriage and 37 (0.5%) had a stillbirth.
The article’s co-author, Alessandro Di Nallo, of the Bocconi University of Milan (Italy), states that “the reasons for these associations may be related to stress, reduced access to prenatal care or changes in lifestyle.”
Di Nallo says her previous research indicated that job loss reduces the likelihood of having children. “This could be because people postpone their plans to have children under conditions of economic uncertainty, but it could also be due to other reasons.”
This researcher explains that stress produces a physiological response that releases hormones that are known to increase the risk of spontaneous abortion or premature birth. ‘Reduced income following job loss could restrict access to and compliance with prenatal care, so that at-risk pregnancies are discovered late or go undetected. In addition, the emotional distress caused by job loss could lead to unhealthy behaviors, such as alcohol consumption, smoking or unhealthy eating,” he adds.
For Köksal, the findings are important as they reveal “a potential, and therefore preventable, socioeconomic factor behind pregnancy losses that can be addressed through effective policy formulation.”
In her opinion, “it is important to raise awareness about the legal rights and protection of women in the workplace during pregnancy, so that they can feel safer and empowered to communicate their pregnancy to their employer. Additionally, stress during pregnancy can have negative effects on both maternal and fetal health. Therefore, the provision of psychological support during pregnancy through the public health system is important regardless of the employment status of the woman and her partner.
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