Pregnancy, births and maternity: introduction

  • This section covers population fertility, pregnancy, maternal and birth outcomes, and breastfeeding. 
  • Infancy through to adolescence are covered in our Children and Young People section, and summarised in the ScotPHO children and young people profile.

 

Pregnancy, births and maternity: risk factors during pregnancy

Smoking

Smoking during pregnancy is associated with increased risk of miscarriage, stillbirth, prematurity, low birth weight and sudden infant death syndrome (SIDS). Smoking can also reduce the likelihood of conception by increasing the amount of time it takes for women to conceive and reducing sperm count in men.  

Data on smoking during pregnancy in Scotland are available from: 

Women who are pregnant or planning to get pregnant can get more information from the NHS Scotland Ready Steady Baby website. 

Alcohol

The UK's four Chief Medical Officers recommend that alcohol is not consumed during pregnancy or while trying to conceive.  

Alcohol consumption during pregnancy can lead to a wide range of development issues and physical disabilities including Foetal Alcohol Spectrum Disorder (FASD).  

  • FASD can cause permanent problems with movement, balance, vision and hearing; learning, such as problems with thinking, concentration, and memory; managing emotions and developing social skills; hyperactivity and impulse control; communication, such as problems with speech as well as joint, muscle, bone, and organ damage.

Data on alcohol use in pregnancy are available from Births in Scotland (Scottish Health and Care Open Data).

 

Drugs

Data on maternal drug use in Scotland are available from:

  1. Our Drug misuse pages
  1. the maternities with drug use recorded indicator in the ScotPHO profiles tool.
  1. Births in Scotland on Scottish Health and Care Open Data.

Poverty

Living in poverty is detrimental to pregnancy outcomes, and is associated with preterm birth, intrauterine growth restriction, neonatal or infant death, and development outcomes of the child.  

Pregnancy can also push women into poverty because of loss of employment income, childcare costs, inflexible work environments (Scottish Government), welfare reforms that limit the support available to low income families (Public Health Scotland) and lack of universal maternity pay. The current rate of maternity allowance on the basic rate is below the National Living Wage (see Maternity Action).

Mothers in low-income households were less likely to report drinking alcohol during pregnancy compared to those in high-income households, however drug misuse and smoking during pregnancy is highest amongst women living in the most deprived areas of Scotland (by Scottish Index of Multiple Deprivation (SIMD) quintile).  

To reduce the health inequalities associated with maternity and birth outcomes, policies that act on the wider determinants of health such as income and employment are needed. Data on levels of poverty in Scotland, including during the first year of life, are available from:  

 

More information is available from the NHS Scotland Ready Steady Baby website. 

 

Pregnancy, births and maternity: policy context

Poverty 

The Scottish Government has identified a number of priority family groups for tackling child poverty, including families with a child under the age of 1.Social security benefits available to pregnant women in Scotland include the:  

Maternity care and birth outcomes 

The best start: a five-year forward plan for maternity and neonatal care in Scotland, published in 2017, set out a vision for the future planning, design and safe delivery of high-quality maternity and neonatal services in Scotland. 

The PHS Maternal and Neonatal Hub was developed to ensure timely and accurate data on outcomes for mothers and children are recorded.  

The Universal Health Visiting Pathway in Scotland (introduced 2015) sets out the minimum core home visiting programme to be offered to all families by Health Visitors. 

Maternal and infant wellbeing 

The national framework on Improving Maternal and Infant Nutrition (2011) sets out actions that can be taken by NHS Boards, local authorities and others to improve the nutrition of pregnant women, babies and young children. 

All maternity units and community NHS services in Scotland received UNICEF Baby Friendly Initiative (BFI) accreditation in 2018.  

All pregnant women in Scotland are entitled to free vitamins. 

Each new child born in Scotland received a baby box of essential items for a child’s first weeks and months to support parents.