Should we freak out about the 2017 solar eclipse and pregnancy?

The 2017 solar eclipse has come and gone now, but it begs a few questions related to pregnancy and newborns. Let’s run through those quickly.

If you were pregnant during the eclipse, is that bad?

Not really. Largely this is based around superstitions, including:

Aztecs believed a lunar eclipse was a result of a bite being taken out of the moon. This idea translated into the Mexican superstition that if a pregnant woman viewed an eclipse, a bite would be taken out of her unborn child’s face. Hindu text credits the eclipse to the head of the demon Rahu, who ate the moon or sun.

Truth is: NASA even had to come out and say the eclipse was not a danger to pregnant women.

What about people going into labor during the eclipse?

While I am sure some women globally went into labor during the eclipse, it probably had more to do with their due date than the actual eclipse. This is one of those cases where religious beliefs often trump science (don’t want to go too far down this rabbit hole). Here’s some information:

“There’s been a couple of studies that show there was no correlation between the moon and what I was saying about deliveries or even cleft lips. There’s been no studies to show that,” said Patel “I had never heard of it, but I found it interesting that different cultures from all around the world feel the same exact specific deformity so it was interesting, but I have never heard of it or seen it.”

Now what about getting pregnant during the eclipse?

Again, I’m sure many people around the world conceived a child yesterday. Will that child grow up to be Thor? Probably not. There was this whole thing that made some meme rounds:

In reality, a lot of religions believe it’s not good to get pregnant during the eclipse. While we all want to think we’re carrying around the next little sun god, there’s no evidence that babies conceived during the last eclipse (1979) — who would be in their late 30s now — are any more dominant or have supernatural powers than the rest of us.

Plus, if we’re being honest, the eclipse lasted about 2 minutes and 40 seconds, so if conception did occur, well…

Any other weird theories you heard during the eclipse hype?