Free Republic

While cancer victims usually blame themselves - I shouldn't have smoked, should have eaten better, should have exercised - or the cruelty of chance, they may now have a new scapegoat: Grandma. Eating poorly during pregnancy can increase your children's and your grandchildren's risk of cancer, even if they themselves eat healthily, a new study on rats suggests. The risk associated with high-fat diets, especially those high in omega-6 fatty acids, "can be passed from one generation to another without any further exposure," said lead researcher Sonia de Assis of Georgetown University. > This should not imply that fat causes...

Girls who eat more omega-3 fatty acids outsmart those who eat higher amounts of omega-6 fatty acids, according to new research. As a result of this and other studies, government dietary recommendations--especially those aimed at pregnant women--should emphasize fish over soy and corn oils, which are respectively high in these fatty acids, says Joseph Hibbeln, a psychiatrist and lipid biochemist at the National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism in Bethesda, Maryland. "We don't want the brain to be deficient in its critical nutrients during development." The omega-3 advantage was first hinted at in studies of distribution of body fat....