Drug-dependent Newborn Babies Are Skyrocketing In Rural Areas, New Study

New research shows an increase of drug dependent newborns in rural areas in America. Women using opioids are often the cause of this issue.

In an article published by NPR, the case of drug-addicted babies is called neonatal abstinence syndrome. This happened when a newborn's mother took drugs like heroin, codeine, opioids, and oxycontin just to name a few, during her pregnancy.

According to Medline Plus, substances from these drugs enter the placenta, which is linked to the baby and the womb. That is the beginning of a child getting addicted to drugs. This becomes worst when the mother doesn't stop using any of the said substances within seven days before giving birth, as her child would be entirely dependent on the content when born.

The hardest part for the baby is that he will experience symptoms of withdrawal at this stage because the drug supply in his system has been ceased the moment he is out of the womb. In most cases, babies can make the drug out of their body. But not all babies have that success that it would even cause their death.

Moving on to the new study about the population of neonatal abstinence syndrome, the document revealed that only an increase of 1.8 percent in births of this case happened from 1.4 per 1000 in urban areas. Compare that to the 7.5 per 1000 births in the countryside.

There were studies before that stated that neonatal abstinence syndrome's effect on a state-level analysis has a disproportion result in rural places. But now, based on these new research, it is safe to conclude that the countryside the United States are gravely affected by babies who are already drug dependents since birth.

This is a wake-up call to all women out there who expecting a child or plans to get pregnant in the future. Stay away from illegal drugs.