Fathers Smoking Cigarettes and Eating Hot dogs

A Father’s Smoking Increases the Risk of Leukemia

A new study I read in article (which you can find HERE) claims that if a baby’s father smoked at all around the time of conception the child child were 15 percent more likely to develop leukemia! Those whose dads smoked at least 20 cigarettes per day around that time were 44 percent more likely to be diagnosed with the cancer. “Sperm containing DNA (damage) can still reach and fertilize an ovum, which may lead to disease in the offspring,” Dr. Milne, who led the research team wrote in an email to Reuters Health. I’d say that’s cause for concern.  Before this information, as long as dad stepped outside and kept his smoke away from the mom-to-be, father’s got off pretty easy. Now, we see that men apparently need to think about their sperm health just as we need to worry about our own health when we try to conceive.

If a father just can’t stand the thought of giving up smoking, he would probably be better off finding a roll-your-own type of cigarette because not only are those not required to be Fire-Safe-Cigarettes, but you can get them additive free and even organic. It’s not going to make smoking safe, but if additives make a smoker smoke more, perhaps switching will help him smoke less.

Same goes for Eating Hot Dogs!

Evidence indicates that children eating more than 12 hot dogs per month have 9 times the normal risk of developing childhood leukemia  but a father who consumes 12 or more hot dogs a month during the time of conception also significantly increases a baby’s chance of eventually getting Leukemia. This all has to do with the addition of nitrates to the meat. Thankfully, there are main stream nitrate free options for hot dogs as well. But just like with the cigarettes, eating nitrate free hot dogs aren’t going to suddenly make them healthy. Buying hot dogs with nitrates in them though is a very dangerous habit to be in.

The point of this though, is as I mention in a previous blog post, fathers need to be careful with their level of toxins prior to conception too. They make up half of the child’s DNA. As an aside, while maternal smoking affects babies in the womb in in a bunch of other ways, it doesn’t seem to increase the rates of leukemia… but eating hot dogs with nitrates does.