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"Alcoholic beverages" are not the only things a doctor tells a pregnant woman to abstain from. There is a huge list of things that are much harder to avoid, lik

"Alcoholic beverages" are not the only things a doctor tells a pregnant woman to abstain from. There is a huge list of things that are much harder to avoid, like soft cheeses or a cat's litter box.

dragonwriter 11y ago
> "Alcoholic beverages" are not the only things a doctor tells a pregnant woman to abstain from. I am quite acutely aware of that, but what's your point?
- freehunter 11y ago
  If you're pregnant, do the things your doctor advises you to do. Don't try to make up the rules as you go along. Just because vanilla extract contains a negligible amount of alcohol doesn't mean a six pack of Natty Ice is okay. That's my point. I'm still not 100% sure what yours was.
  - dragonwriter 11y ago
    > If you're pregnant, do the things your doctor advises you to do. Don't try to make up the rules as you go along. The issue of absence of science on which to base certain recommendations affects doctors providing advice as much as pregnant women making up their own rules as they go along. > Just because vanilla extract contains a negligible amount of alcohol doesn't mean a six pack of Natty Ice is okay. Vanilla extract doesn't contain a negligible amount of alcohol (its typically 35% ABV, Vodka is 35-50% ABV -- homemade vanilla extract is typically vodka in which vanilla beans have been soaked for an extend period of time, and then removed); its just typically used in small quantities. > doesn't mean a six pack of Natty Ice is okay. No one in this thread has suggested that. What has been suggested is that: (1) Science making clear the impact of different levels of alcohol consumption in pregnancy isn't clear (and guidance from medical sources based on that lack of science is, unsurprisingly, mixed, though government guidance in the US and most other countries is fairly consistently for complete abstinence.) [0] (2) Complete abstention from alcohol (vs. complete abstention from things labelled as alcoholic beverages) isn't easy. [0] And, while it hasn't been discussed previously, in the thread, there's even some controversy over whether the research establishing the correlation between "Fetal Alcohol Syndrome" (which is relatively rare even among children of women who drink heavily in pregnancy) and alcohol consumption actually establishes causality (there are strong reasons to think that,at a minimum, there are other factors at play, and its not impossible that alcohol may not be a cause at all -- the much higher rates some studies have shown in FAS among children of heavy-drinking low-income mothers vs. heavy-drinking high-income mothers, along with the fact that FAS symptoms are sometimes seen in children of women who completely abstain are suggestive that alcohol consumption is neither a necessary nor sufficient cause of FAS, and may even just be something that happens to frequently happen alongside the things that are the actual risk factors, such that controlling alcohol consumption isn't actually useful in preventing FAS.)
    - freehunter 11y ago
      And literally my last word is: "If you tell women "don't drink", that's a very clear statement. Easy to follow. If you say "only drink one drink per week, maybe, we don't really know", there's a non-zero chance that more women will drink more than they should than we have today. But how much is too much? No one knows. So in effect, how much is too much? Any amount."

"Alcoholic beverages" are not the only things a doctor tells a pregnant woman to abstain from. There is a huge list of things that are much harder to avoid, like soft cheeses or a cat's litter box.

dragonwriter 11y ago

> "Alcoholic beverages" are not the only things a doctor tells a pregnant woman to abstain from. I am quite acutely aware of that, but what's your point?

freehunter 11y ago
If you're pregnant, do the things your doctor advises you to do. Don't try to make up the rules as you go along. Just because vanilla extract contains a negligible amount of alcohol doesn't mean a six pack of Natty Ice is okay. That's my point. I'm still not 100% sure what yours was.
- dragonwriter 11y ago
  > If you're pregnant, do the things your doctor advises you to do. Don't try to make up the rules as you go along. The issue of absence of science on which to base certain recommendations affects doctors providing advice as much as pregnant women making up their own rules as they go along. > Just because vanilla extract contains a negligible amount of alcohol doesn't mean a six pack of Natty Ice is okay. Vanilla extract doesn't contain a negligible amount of alcohol (its typically 35% ABV, Vodka is 35-50% ABV -- homemade vanilla extract is typically vodka in which vanilla beans have been soaked for an extend period of time, and then removed); its just typically used in small quantities. > doesn't mean a six pack of Natty Ice is okay. No one in this thread has suggested that. What has been suggested is that: (1) Science making clear the impact of different levels of alcohol consumption in pregnancy isn't clear (and guidance from medical sources based on that lack of science is, unsurprisingly, mixed, though government guidance in the US and most other countries is fairly consistently for complete abstinence.) [0] (2) Complete abstention from alcohol (vs. complete abstention from things labelled as alcoholic beverages) isn't easy. [0] And, while it hasn't been discussed previously, in the thread, there's even some controversy over whether the research establishing the correlation between "Fetal Alcohol Syndrome" (which is relatively rare even among children of women who drink heavily in pregnancy) and alcohol consumption actually establishes causality (there are strong reasons to think that,at a minimum, there are other factors at play, and its not impossible that alcohol may not be a cause at all -- the much higher rates some studies have shown in FAS among children of heavy-drinking low-income mothers vs. heavy-drinking high-income mothers, along with the fact that FAS symptoms are sometimes seen in children of women who completely abstain are suggestive that alcohol consumption is neither a necessary nor sufficient cause of FAS, and may even just be something that happens to frequently happen alongside the things that are the actual risk factors, such that controlling alcohol consumption isn't actually useful in preventing FAS.)
  - freehunter 11y ago
    And literally my last word is: "If you tell women "don't drink", that's a very clear statement. Easy to follow. If you say "only drink one drink per week, maybe, we don't really know", there's a non-zero chance that more women will drink more than they should than we have today. But how much is too much? No one knows. So in effect, how much is too much? Any amount."