Does exposure to analgesics in utero cause schizophrenia?
RL O’Reilly The cause of schizophrenia, a serious mental illness characterized by hallucinations, delusions and a marked deterioration in social functioning, is an enigma that continues to perplex the scientific community. While we know that approximately 80% of the risk of developing schizophrenia is conferred by genes (1), no research group has yet located a gene(s) contributing to the cause of schizophrenia. Moreover, while a significant environmental contribution is indicated by the fact that one-half of monozygotic twins pairs are discordant for schizophrenia, the nature of this environmental contribution is still controversial. The past theory that an abnormal family upbringing was the causative environmental factor has not stood up to scientific scrutiny. In recent years, the search for causative environmental factors has focused on the possibility that some type of prenatal insult predisposes the fetus to develop schizophrenia in early adult life. The initial suspicion of an in
