baby daddy

Need another reason to convince your guy to quit smoking? New research shows that fathers who smoke are more likely to have children with asthma – even if they quit the habit before their baby is conceived!

The risk of developing asthma is even higher if dad smoked before he was 15 and increases with every year he’s been lighting up.

The new study, presented this week at the Annual Scientific Meeting of the Thoracic Society of Australia and New Zealand on the Gold Coast, was the first time that dad’s smoking habits before conception had been looked at.

“This study is important as it is the first study looking at how a father’s smoking habit pre-conception can affect the respiratory health of his children,” Dr. Jennifer Koplin said as she presented the findings.

“Given these results, we can presume that exposure to any type of air pollution, from occupational exposures to chemical exposures, could also have an effect.”

Australia’s School of Population and Global Health, University of Melbourne, and the Murdoch Children’s Institute, Melbourne, were involved in the study that looked at 13,000 parents (both men and women) and 24,000 children.

As a non-scientist, I was pretty surprised that the researchers didn’t find a link between the mother’s smoking before conception and a child’s asthma, just the dads.

But, when you add this study to the fact that smoking tends to affect sperm quality, making it harder to conceive, it makes it pretty clear that if guys are even just thinking about becoming fathers, it’s a good time to quit!