Gaining insights into reproductive health from historical events

Maternal exposures may affect offspring reproductive health, but these effects are likely small, requiring large samples, or large changes in the exposure to detect. Also, enough time must pass to allow the offspring to reach an age at which the health endpoints of interest are observable. Drastic historical events that affect large numbers of people and are discrete in their time period of occurrence, provide an opportunity to examine how the maternal prenatal experience influences the reproductive health of the offspring.