Parental diet before conception affects child's health

PARIS: A child's health can be compromised not only by a mother who smokes or drinks during pregnancy, but by the obesity and poor diet of both parents well before the act of procreation, researchers said on Tuesday.

What a mother and father eat, and whether they are seriously overweight, in other words, can have "profound implications for the growth, development and long-term health of their children before conception," they warned in a trio of studies.