A study by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention found while having babies too close together could be bad for the infants' health, having them too far apart might be worse. Both situations raise the risk that the new baby will be premature or small, which can cause long-term health problems, even death. The CDC study calculated waiting 18 to 23 months after giving birth to get pregnant again is best.
Many mothers already space their children a couple of years apart.
That way, they won't have two children in diapers, and the youngsters will be close enough in age to play together when they get older. The study was based on 173,205 births in Utah from 1989 to 1996. The results were published in today's New England Journal of Medicine. He theorized the reason getting pregnant after a long interval is risky is the body becomes primed for birth during the earlier pregnancy, with the uterus enlarging and blood flow to the womb increasing, but those benefits decline over time. Us Copyright 1998, Milwaukee Journal Sentinel.