Depression drugs risk to newborns

Published on Thursday 9 February 2006 01:08

BABIES born to women taking commonly prescribed anti-depressants such as Prozac have an increased risk of suffering severe respiratory failure.

Persistent pulmonary hypertension (PPHN) is a rare but life-threatening condition in which a newborn's system fails to adapt to breathing outside the womb.

Scientists in the United States found that while PPHN normally occurs in one to two babies per 1,000 births, it increased to six per 1,000 when women took certain drugs in late pregnancy.

The findings, published today in the New England Journal of Medicine, indicate that women who take drugs such as Prozac, Paxil or Zoloft in the second half of pregnancy have a small but significantly higher chance of delivering an infant who develops PPHN. Other drugs did not pose a risk.