According to the leading U.S pediatricians, drinking alcoholic beverages of any amount is harmful for pregnant women. Health professionals have pointed out that consumption of alcohol is considered as one of the major causes of birth defects and neurodevelopment disabilities.
For the last decades, scientific studies have suggested that minimal intake of alcohol is not harmful for pregnant women. However, a latest clinical report from American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) pointed out that no amount of alcohol is safe to consume during pregnancy period.
Dr. Janet Williams stated some facts concerning the effect of alcohol for pregnant women.
"The only guarantee of having no effects from alcohol is no prenatal alcohol exposure," said by the professor of pediatrics at the University of Texas Health Science Center and co-author of the clinical report from APP.
According to the information given by the APP, fetal alcohol spectrum disorder is one of the effects of alcohol intake. The said syndrome is a type of birth defect which produces variety of harms such as hyperactivity, attention problems, difficulty to cope up in school, learning abilities, speech and language delays and also poor reasoning.
The report also stated that roughly five percent of the children are affected by the said birth defect. As of the moment, APP is having a difficult time in determining the exact number of affected children. Educating parents in terms of the link of alcohol and its physical and behavioral effects for children were also hard for the pediatricians.
Furthermore, a 2013 study supports the APP report. According to the said research, pregnant women who are drinking in the first trimester increase their risks of symptoms 12 times. Drinking in the first and second trimester will increase it to 61 times and drinking throughout the pregnancy period will make a woman 65 times susceptible to the risks.
Denmark researcher named Nicalsen suggested that drinking all kinds of alcohol should be avoided by pregnant and trying-to-be-pregnant women.