Viral Infection During Pregnancy Raises Risk.

• Position: AUTISM & SCHIZOPHRENIA - Brief article

Disrupted fetal immune system development, such as that caused by viral infection in the mother, may be a key factor in the later appearance of certain neurodevelopmental disorders. This finding emerges from a Weizmann Institute of Science, Rehovot, Israel, study that may explain, among other things, how the mother's infection with the cytomegalovirus (CMV) during pregnancy, which affects her own and her fetus' immune system, increases the risk that her offspring will develop autism or schizophrenia, sometimes years later.

"Previous studies had shown that the timing of the disruption in the mother's immune system during pregnancy affects the type of brain damage her child may develop. For example, a viral infection in early pregnancy raises the risk of autism, whereas an infection later in the pregnancy raises the risk of schizophrenia," says Ido Amit of the Department of Immunology. "We've set out to examine the mechanisms behind these phenomena, while focusing on the role the immune...