Maybe they should stop eating cheese, too.

My Facebook feed is blowing up with snarky comments in response to the CDC's just released report and recommendations on Fetal Alcohol Syndrome.  As I understand it, researchers have yet to identify any "safe" level of alcohol consumption during any stage of pregnancy, in part because it would be unethical to test the proposition through blind studies etc.   The CDC voices its concern that women reportedly continue drinking alcohol (meaning, they have had at least one drink within the past 30 days, if I am reading CDC's website correctly), when they attempt to become pregnant.  Plus, many women who are not even trying to conceive have unplanned pregnancies, and they report drinking too.  So, the CDC tells us in quite an alarmed tone: "3 million US women" risk "exposing their developing baby to alcohol." To eliminate the risks associated with such exposure, the CDC recommends no alcohol consumption for those who are or even "might be" pregnant. In other words, unless a sexually active woman of childbearing age is using birth control, she should stop drinking.      

This is not the first time this issue has surfaced, but it is the first time abstention has been recommended not just for those who are pregnant, but also for those who are of childbearing age and engaging in unprotected sex. 

Predictably, the expansion of this advice has triggered a firestorm of criticism, particularly with regard to women who are not even trying to get pregnant. Some see it as puritanical; others contend that it is unrealistic and at odds with common practice.   

Here is the comment that most interested me: On Huffington Post, an Assistant Professor of Obstetrics at UNC was interviewed.  She was sympathetic to the CDC's overall goal, but commented that it was unrealistic to ask women trying to conceive to cease all alcohol consumption whatsoever.  Then she said:

"It’s probable that that one glass of wine is not going to do anything, but you tell women that it’s safe to drink in pregnancy and then you end up with all this fetal alcohol syndrome -- and it is entirely preventable." [emphasis added]

Oh, there are so many problems with this statement.  First, it flies in the face of the high-risk factors listed on the NIH's website (binge drinking, tobacco and drug use, poor maternal health, poverty).  Second, it implies permissive medical advice has contributed to some high incidence of FAS ("you end up with all this"), when in fact the pervasiveness seems to be fairly low and according to some, possibly overstated.  Third, it equates a medical provider's permissive attitude towards "one glass of wine" with telling a patient she can drink all she wants throughout her entire pregnancy.  Are medical providers so fearful that women will hear one thing and then do another? 

The CDC's report reflects a certain type of judgment in which policymakers abandon all nuance because it is easier to be safe than sorry.  Here, I find it difficult to believe that this approach will do anything more than frighten some women unnecessarily and turn off a whole bunch of others.