Many things are said about the true damage caused by alcohol in pregnancy. "Total a drink, nothing happens", "Anxiety is worse than a drink". Well no, the best is not a drop of alcohol. Consumption, even if moderate, can cause irreversible damage to the fetus.
In the United Kingdom, government guidelines that recommended pregnant women a maximum of two drinks per week were maintained, but now specialists want to change the recommendations because they believe that "alcohol can cause more harm to the fetus than smoking tobacco or even marijuana."
Of 730,000 births that occur annually in England, 1 percent suffer from behavioral or developmental problems due to alcohol exposure. This is nothing less than more than 7 thousand children affected each year.
A consultant, who also did not hit the mark with the phrase, since tobacco and marijuana can also cause problems in the baby, especially under weight, said that "if women should have a bad habit during pregnancy, it would be safer to smoke tobacco or cannabis than to drink alcohol. "
The truth is that each organism is different, and what in one pregnant woman may not do anything, in another it can have serious consequences. It is not known for sure the amount that can affect the baby, although it seems not, even a moderate consumption of alcohol in pregnancy can affect the baby.
Neil Aiton, a pediatrician at Brighton and Sussex University Hospitals, points out that alcohol causes long-term psychological and neurological damage to the nervous system. Alcohol consumption in pregnancy is the second cause of mental disorder, it is also related to malformations, growth retardation, low weight, behavioral problems, and in important consumption during pregnancy babies born with fetal alcohol syndrome.
Even so, it is incomprehensible that between 20 and 45% of pregnant women consume alcohol when prevention is simple: stop drinking.
