Objective: To examine how the effect of disadvantaged socioeconomic circumstances on the risk of paediatric infections is mediated by pregnancy smoking, excess weight during pregnancy and breast feeding in children under 5 years of age.
Design: A population-level, retrospective cohort study. The Swedish Medical Birth Register was combined with the National Patient Register, the longitudinal integration database for health insurance and labour market studies, the Cause of Death Register and a local register held by the Child Health Care Unit in Uppsala Region.
Setting: Uppsala Region, Sweden.
Patients: 63 216 term and post-term singletons born to women who resided in Uppsala Region, Sweden between 1997 and 2015.
Main outcome measures: Number of hospital admissions for infectious diseases. Secondary outcomes were the number of hospitalisations for respiratory and enteric infections, respectively.
Results: The effect of disadvantaged socioeconomic circumstances, that is, low maternal education on the overall risk of paediatric infections was mediated to a considerable (33%-64%) proportion by pregnancy smoking, excess weight during pregnancy and breast feeding.
Conclusions: Pregnancy smoking, excess weight during pregnancy and breast feeding mediate a considerable proportion of the association between deprived socioeconomic circumstances and paediatric infectious diseases. Therefore, inequalities in paediatric infectious diseases may be reduced by public health policies addressing these health-related behaviours.
BMJ Publishing Group Ltd, 2024. Vol. 109, no 3, p. 195-200