Mediterranean magic - why following this diet when pregnant is healthier!

Eating well for two..

New research suggests that mothers who eat lots of vegetables, fruit, nuts and fish while pregnant give birth to children who are significantly less likely to suffer from allergies. The study also found that eating high levels (more than three or four times a week) of red meat increased the risk of the children suffering.

The research, which was carried out by the University of Crete, and published in the Journal Thorax, looked at 468 mothers and their children from the Spanish island of Menorca.

It found that eating vegetables more than eight times a week, and following a diet rich in olive oil, fruit, legumes (such as beans and lentils) and fish, is particularly healthy, and anti-allergy. Children born to mothers who followed this kind of diet most closely were 78 per cent less likely to have asthma by the time they reached six years old, compared with women who did not eat follow it.

Previous research carried out by the same team found that children who ate such a so-called “Mediterranean diet” seemed to be protected from asthma and allergies, but this suggests that such a protective effect begins even before birth.

Over 5 million people in the UK suffer from asthma - with 1.1 million of them children. There were just over 1,300 deaths from asthma in the UK in 2005, with 27 of those children aged 14 or under.