Drinking tea during pregnancy may be bad for your baby’s health

A new study in Ireland has found a link between tea drinking during pregnancy and smaller babies.

Caffeine is the most commonly used psychoactive substance in the world. And at average consumption levels, it is considered to be good for your health – or at least not bad for your health. However, emerging evidence suggests that consuming caffeine during pregnancy may be bad for the baby. Our latest study adds to that evidence.

We wanted to know if there is a link between maternal caffeine intake and negative birth outcomes in a population where tea is the main caffeine source. To do so, we used data from an Irish cohort study. The data, on about 1,000 Irish women, provided us with the usual dietary intakes of caffeinated products during early pregnancy. We matched these with hospital records of the women’s newborns to get information on the birth size and gestational age at birth.