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Her Metabolism is a Minnesota USA Nonprofit (501c3), offering free nonpartisan evidence-based science and education about her metabolism.

 

Teen Motherhood and Down Syndrome

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Updated and Verified: November 09, 2024 (News page records significant changes.)

Mainstream science shows that teen motherhood commonly creates countless massive metabolic health benefits for the woman and her baby. One stunning example is teen motherhood 's effect on Down Syndrome risk.

Down Syndrome is a metabolic disease.1 Down Syndrome commonly causes these comorbidities, among others2:

Governments and other businesses often stigmatize and even demonize teen motherhood, while promoting and even glamorizing delayed motherhood. One example is the United States federal government's Office of Population Affairs, which gives taxes to "develop and evaluate new and innovative approaches to prevent teen pregnancy."3 Meanwhile, young maternal age greatly protects against countless metabolic risks and harms, including Down Syndrome. Indeed, the youngest mothers are hundreds of times less likely than the oldest mothers to afflict their kids with Down Syndrome.4-5

Sources 4 and 5, below

References

References

  1. Dierssen M, Fructuoso M, Martínez de Lagrán M, Perluigi M, Barone E. Down Syndrome is a metabolic disease: Altered insulin signaling mediates peripheral and brain dysfunctions. Front Neurosci. 2020;14:670. http://doi.org/doi:10.3389/fnins.2020.00670
  2. What conditions or disorders are commonly associated with Down syndrome? NIH: Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute of Child Health and Human Development. Published 2023. https://www.nichd.nih.gov/health/topics/down/conditioninfo/associated
  3. Teen pregnancy prevention program. Office of Population Affairs: U.S. Office of Health and Human Services. Accessed June 1, 2024. https://opa.hhs.gov/grant-programs/teen-pregnancy-prevention-program
  4. Khoshnood B, Pryde PG, Mittendorf R. Ethnic differences in the impact of advanced maternal age on birth prevalence of Down syndrome. Am J Public Health. 2000;90(11):1778-1781. http://doi.org/doi:10.2105/AJPH.90.11.1778
  5. Hook EB, Cross PK, Schreinemachers DM. Chromosomal abnormality rates at amniocentesis and in live-born infants. JAMA. 1983;249(15):2034-2038. http://doi.org/doi:10.1001/jama.1983.03330390038028

Medical, Legal, and Metabolic Advice

Here in the USA, jurisdiction matters a lot. It is generally illegal and a bad idea for anyone but a jurisdiction-licensed physician to give medical advice, anyone but a jurisdiction-licensed attorney to give legal advice, anyone but a jurisdiction-licensed nutritionist or registered dietician to give metabolic advice, and so forth. This website's information is generally incomplete to predict how applying it may affect a given visitor - because the effects depend on the person's unique circumstances and characteristics.

So, here is the only medical, legal, and metabolic advice on this website: None of this website is individualized medical, legal, or metabolic advice. It is general information. You should not try to apply any of this information to your life, unless you know what you are doing. Generally, the governments of USA's jurisdictions (states and territories) declare two things through law:

  1. Without the guidance of a jurisdiction-licensed physician, attorney, or nutritionist: you do not know what you are doing, so it is unwise and unsafe for you to make too many decision about your medical, legal, and metabolic status and circumstances, and
  2. no one but a licensed physician, attorney, or nutritionist can safely and effectively advise you about those statuses and circumstances - thus, it is generally illegal for anyone else to try.

Obviously, those standards are extremely conservative, if not heavy-handed. However, one should remember that many of those people in government who uphold such strict standards have seen the stuff of nightmares: predictable, preventable, terrible consequences when the least capable and least conscientious people make the worst decisions - whether medically, legally, nutritionally, or otherwise. So, it is not wildly unreasonable to promote - even to legally command - erring on the safe side. Still, various jurisdictions do provide some exceptions to those exceptionally strict standards under law.

Here in Minnesota (and in many other U.S. states and territories) a person can help you with certain aspects of your medical, legal, and metabolic status and circumstances - even when that person is not formally licensed by the jurisdiction. Minnesota, for example, allows various people besides licensed nutritionists and registered dieticians to give metabolic advice and guidance: certain Complementary and Alternative Health Care providers, which Minnesota allows under law. Minn. Stat. § 146A. Thus, one need not feel completely locked into the strict standards listed above (though jurisdictions do typically still hold alternative providers to certain basic standards under law). Instead, in the USA, one can discuss the information on this website, and receive guidance about it, from various experts - whether jurisdiction-licensed or not. Meanwhile, this thorough and smart-sounding notice and explanation should not tempt any visitor into having any extra trust for the information in this website. At most, as the saying goes: "trust but verify."

Sincerely,

Dr. R. Floyd Lindquist

Her Metabolism: Founder, Treasurer, Secretary, Lead Data Scientist, and Director of Communications and Research

PhD (Thanatology), PsyD (Psychology), DLP (Law and Policy), MPH (Nutrition & Epidemiology), MS (Nutrition), MA (Counseling)

floyd[at]hermetabolism[dot]org

Her Metabolism is a Minnesota Nonprofit (501c3)