Eating more egg and peanut in pregnancy does not prevent infant allergy

The edition in brief

An Australian and New Zealand randomised trial of 2,137 pregnant women with a high family allergy burden found that a diet rich in egg and peanut from before 23 weeks until four months of breastfeeding did not reduce IgE-mediated egg or peanut allergy in infants at one year (7.8% vs 8.4%; RR 0.93, 95% CI 0.69 to 1.26). Women need not change their diet to protect the baby, and need not avoid these foods either. A meta-analysis of vaping in pregnancy found higher odds of preterm birth than no exposure and no difference from cigarette smoking, on low-to-moderate certainty evidence. PCOS has been renamed polyendocrine metabolic ovarian syndrome after an international consensus; the diagnostic criteria are unchanged, but the condition should be recorded as an obstetric risk modifier at booking. A small Turkish trial found carbetocin given before placental delivery reduced haemorrhage but raised manual removal. The practice-changer: in 21,743 pregnancies, a 35–37 week scan picked up only about a third of large babies, and screen-positive women had more intrapartum caesareans and more maternal morbidity, while missed large babies came to no extra neonatal harm — an argument against routine term screening for fetal size.