Mothers that take folic acid or multivitamins before and during pregnancy can significantly lower a child’s risk of autism, according to the latest research published in the Journal of the American Medical Association Psychiatry. Researchers from Canada, Israel and the School of Medicine at Mount Sinai, in New York City, studied 45,300 children, at the age of 10 on average, correlating children’s autism spectrum diagnoses with records of mothers’ supplementation.

They found that women that took the supplements prior to pregnancy were 61 percent less likely to have a child diagnosed with autism. Taking supplements during pregnancy was linked to a 73 percent reduced risk. The overall likelihood of autism was 1.3 percent of the children.

This article appears in the August 2018 issue of Natural Awakenings.