Advising pregnant women on alcohol is 'patronising and unethical'

The official guidelines on drinking alcohol while pregnant are often "paternalistic and ethically dubious", one expert has argued. Citing a spate of recent reports which offer differing advice on the matter, Dr Colin Gavaghan of the School of Law at the University of Glasgow has argued that evidence linking the moderate consumption of alcohol with foetal damage is "far from clear cut" and as such doctors should be wary of lecturing expectant women.

Writing in the latest issue of the Journal of Medical Ethics, he explained that many women may actually benefit from the occasional drink while pregnant, with alcohol helping mothers-to-be to relax.

"For an increasing number of people, however, it seems as though the quality of life of the pregnant woman is so far behind the interests of the future child in any scale of ethical relevance as to be beneath consideration altogether," he added.

Meanwhile, Reuters Health has reported that the 2009 Joint Conference of the Society for Research on Nicotine and Tobacco (SRNT) has heard that antidepressant drugs could not only improve the mood of substance-dependent pregnant women, but could also help them to quit smoking.