In a report dated October 2015, the American Academy of Pediatrics stresses that no amount of alcohol should be considered safe to drink during any trimester of pregnancy, and other recommendations advise the same.
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) state, “There is no known safe amount of alcohol to drink while pregnant. There is also no safe time during pregnancy to drink and no safe kind of alcohol.”
The American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists (ACOG) “reiterates its long-standing position that no amount of alcohol consumption can be considered safe during pregnancy.”
The Surgeon General first advised women to not drink alcohol during pregnancy in 1981, and issued a new advisory in 2005. The advisory says, “Based on the current, best science available we now know the following:
- No amount of alcohol during pregnancy can be considered safe;
- Alcohol can damage an unborn baby at any stage of pregnancy;
- Damage to an unborn baby can be caused in the earliest weeks of pregnancy, before a woman even knows she is pregnant;
- The effects on baby’s brain and behavior from drinking alcohol during pregnancy are lifelong.”
“For these reasons:
- A pregnant woman should not drink alcohol during pregnancy;
- A pregnant woman who has already consumed alcohol during pregnancy should stop;
- A woman who is considering becoming pregnant should not drink alcohol.”
Although all recommendations say the safest bet is to not drink alcohol during pregnancy, 1 in 10 women still report drinking alcohol during pregnancy. There is a lot of mixed information about drinking alcohol during pregnancy, which makes it more difficult for women to make decisions for themselves and their unborn babies.