Women who have anorexia are likely to have been born in spring or early summer. Some 13 per cent more female anorexics than average are born between March and June, a study by a Scottish researcher has revealed.
These findings could link common winter infections, such as influenza in pregnant women, to anorexia in their offspring, according to a report by Dr John Eagles of the Royal Cornhill Hospital in Aberdeen, published in the latest issue of the International Journal of Eating Disorders.
"It's not the whole answer," Dr Eagles said, but it could be a cause of the disease, anorexia nervosa, which affects one in 100 girls in the US.
Anorexics are preoccupied with dieting and keeping slim often to the extent of being dangerously under-nourished.
The records of 446 Scottish women anorexics were studied by Dr Eagles. Each suffered symptoms of anorexia between 1965 and 1997. They were compared with a control group of 5,766 women born in the same region of Scotland.