Women in the military could have a higher risk of giving birth to low-weight babies than their civilian counterparts, according to a scientific review published this week.
The review, which analyzed 21 separate studies of pregnancies in the U.S. military from 1979 to 2023, found that about two-thirds of the studies concluded that active-duty servicewomen may be at heightened risk of having babies with a low birth weight.
Still, the review did not find clear evidence that servicewomen have an increased risk of stillbirth or premature births.
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The review, which was written by U.K. researchers and published in the journal BMJ Military Health, “highlights a need for female-specific research in other armed forces” beyond the U.S. military, the authors concluded.
“From the service perspective, promoting the health of mother and baby can contribute to operational effectiveness through faster return to duty, retention in the service and increased deployability,” the researchers, led by Kirsten Morris of the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, wrote in the review published Monday. “Hence, improved pregnancy outcomes are important both for the families concerned and for the service as a whole.”
While the researchers were focused on the implications of the review on militaries outside the United States, U.S. policymakers have also been…
