Childhood obesity is a growing problem, with over 20% of children in developed countries found to be overweight. Obesity in childhood increases the risk of cardiovascular disease and diabetes in later life. So, what is causing the increase in obesity in children? A new study suggests that the problem starts before birth in the womb, and the clue lies in the infant's first stool. Meconium—the earliest stool of an infant—is composed of materials ingested during the time the infant spends in the uterus. The new study published in Pediatric Obesity found that the types of normal bacteria found in the meconium could predict an infant’s likelihood of later developing obesity. In the study of 212 newborns, children who became overweight at 3 years of age differed in their meconium bacterial makeup from those with normal weight, having a higher proportion of bacteria in the Bacteroidetes phylum (29% versus 15%). So, the microbiome of the first‐pass meconium predicted su...
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