Generality
The negative effects of alcohol on pregnancy are now well known and documented.
Although the majority of these damages are related to the ingestion of large quantities of alcohol, there is no "safe" dose that can be taken without risk.
Alcohol Damage in Pregnancy
The children of mothers who have had severe alcohol problems during pregnancy are subject to a typical syndrome, characterized by dysfunctions of the nervous system (up to a mere mental retardation), growth and immune deficiencies, but also real morphogenetic alterations (even the aesthetics of the face is seriously compromised). Alcohol, which overcomes the placental barrier without any problem and rapidly reaches the structures most sensitive to its toxicity, has a teratogenic action; as such, it can produce changes in fetal development and damage to various organs and functions.
In this regard, doctors speak of SAF, an acronym for Fetal Alcoholic Syndrome (or alcoholic embryo-fetopathy), which can manifest itself with various levels of severity, therefore with nuanced or more or less serious symptoms.
Is there a Safe Alcohol Dose?
Although the incidence of this characteristic clinical picture, including the less obvious forms, is found in more than half of the alcoholic mothers, it is not yet clear what the exact influence of the extent of ethylism on the development of the syndrome is. A dose of 30 grams of alcohol taken daily throughout the first 90 days of pregnancy (eg 300 ml of wine per day or 600 ml of beer) seems to represent, in this sense, a risk factor of 11%. In this first period, the fetus is in fact particularly at risk, because it is subject to intense phenomena of proliferation and cellular specialization. Even the consumption of small quantities of alcohol could therefore cause serious damage to the unborn child, given that there is a genetic susceptibility with an individual danger threshold different from subject to subject.
Alcohol in the 2nd and 3rd Quarter
As mentioned, it is better not to drink alcohol during pregnancy, especially in the first trimester .
Subsequently, if the mother cannot give it up even after having received support in the structures specialized in care and help, she should try to limit the doses as much as possible, taking alcohol only during meals and in any case without exceeding the glass of wine or can of beer a day. Consuming large quantities of alcohol in the second half of pregnancy, in fact, although not causing a fetal alcoholic syndrome with classic facial dimorphism, can lead to serious and permanent neuronal damage to the unborn child, with consequent psychomotor retardation. Furthermore, immediately after birth, the newborn may present withdrawal symptoms characterized by restlessness, vomiting, tremors, hyperreflexia and convulsions.
Smoking and drug and anxiolytic abuse contribute to aggravate the clinical manifestations associated with the significant consumption of alcohol during pregnancy.
