Pica, which comes from the Latin word for "magpie," is a physiological eating disorder that is characterized by the desire to items that are not food.
Studies of pica have found that roughly one in five pregnant women experience it.
A study of pregnant women with pica found that half of them ate ice and around 15 percent of them ate clay, cornstarch or some form of dirt.
The practice of eating dirt, which is known as geophagia, happens more frequently in the deep South of the United States and in some African countries, including Uganda and Kenya, where some people eat dirt to practice religious customs or to relieve a stomach ache.
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