Drinking in Pregnancy

According to that well known medical expert, Rachel Weisz, it's OK to drink alcohol when pregnant.

Nothing against Ms Weisz - I admire her as an actress and not long ago she gave birth to a bouncing baby boy. But if, as she says, she drank after the 12th week of her pregnancy, and her little son is fine, then that's a matter of luck.

The problem is - and it's a fact - that we have no way of knowing how sensitive any developing foetus is to the toxic effects of alcohol.

Just to go back to Ms Weisz for a moment: she says it does your baby no harm after 12 weeks and, in terms of damaging the vital organs of a baby, that's partly true.

All the vital organs are in place by then so there's hardly any chance of your growing baby developing an abnormality, such as a heart or lung defect, after that.

But alcohol can harm your baby all the way through pregnancy, right up to birth, because it stunts brain development.

When alcohol affects an unborn baby's brain you get Foetal Alcohol Syndrome and with it a high risk of your child having learning difficulties, poor coordination and clumsiness (dyspraxia), inability to concentrate and attention deficit hyperactivity disorder.

Timebomb for tots?

IT'S hard to equate the odd glass of wine with your baby suffering all of that, but it's a fact. And because we can't predict how much alcohol will affect which baby it's safer to abstain.

I've never agreed with our own government's guidelines, which allow two units (two small glasses of wine or one measure of spirits) once or twice a week. I fall in behind the recommendations of the US and Canada, which recommends no alcohol for mums-to-be.

Ms Weisz is dangerously misinformed when she says pregnant women drink freely in Europe. As of October 2007 it will be mandatory in France to place a warning about drinking in pregnancy on alcoholic drinks.

The difficulty arises when you know women who have drunk while carrying a baby and their child has turned out healthy.

Well, even for them there may be a timebomb ticking.

Quite often the real problems only begin to show up when that child starts school and can't keep up with other children of the same age.

The Mirror