By Anu Dev
Think for 2; don’t drink or smoke for 2 (The following was written as the intro to a CAPE project five years ago. Intimations of future career specialisation?)
It is said we are what we eat. When it comes to a pregnant woman, her child is not only what she eats but whatever enters her bloodstream by whatever route. During pregnancy, all nine months of it, it therefore behoves the mother to always remember that whatever she eats, her baby eats and whatever she drinks, her baby drinks. In the same way most mothers would not contemplate putting alcohol in their baby’s milk, they should not even consider drinking alcohol or using drugs while pregnant because the effects on the developing foetus are just as toxic.
The baby may not be conscious of the effects while in the womb, but after birth, and years after, the baby will continue to suffer from the effects of its mother’s folly. Alcohol passes easily through the placental barrier and the foetus is less equipped to eliminate alcohol than its mother. Furthermore, the babies are affected more by the exposure to alcohol than the mothers, since the developing foetus cannot break down the alcohol as the mother and consequently, the foetus receives a higher concentration of alcohol. Babies born to mothers who used alcohol are likely to be born with low birth weight, small head circumference, developmental delays, organ dysfunction, facial abnormalities, epilepsy, and poor coordination.
Nerve and brain disorders are especially prominent if the alcohol is imbibed during the second and third trimesters of pregnancy, since it is during this timeframe that complex brain development occurs. Such exposed babies are born with poor motor skills and poor learning abilities. Physical deformation of the brain itself may also occur, with small head size and other abnormalities such as cerebellar hypoplasia. If alcohol is consumed during the first trimester, it interferes with the migration and organisation of brain cells, causing structural deformities. During the third trimester, damage can be caused to the hippocampus, affecting memory, emotion and the encoding of auditory and visual information. Babies who suffer from growth deficiency, the three facial deformities, central nervous system damage and prenatal alcohol exposure are said to suffer from Foetal Alcohol Syndrome.
Drinking alcohol is not the only bad habit a pregnant woman should endeavour to break: smoking is another one that is just as deadly.
Cigarette smoke contains over 4000 chemicals, with lead and cyanide being just two of the 60+ carcinogenic chemicals. The nicotine from cigarette smoke narrows blood vessels in the umbilical cord[1]; effectively decreasing the amount of oxygen available to the baby. Additionally, the carbon monoxide present combines with the haemoglobin of the red blood cells carrying the oxygen thereby decreasing the oxygen capacity of those cells.
Babies born to women who smoke are usually underweight due to their underdeveloped bodies. Their lungs may not even be able to work on their own due to delayed lung development caused by nicotine. These babies are also especially vulnerable to asthma and other respiratory ailments. Furthermore, babies whose mothers smoked during the first trimester of pregnancy are more likely to suffer from heart defects at birth. Nicotine also retards brain development: the developing brain being particularly sensitive to low oxygen levels, especially affecting the areas of the brain that control breathing. Additionally, nicotine is poisonous to the areas of the brain directly involved with heart and breathing functions.
Passive smoking – inhalation of second-hand smoke – also affects the baby and may lead to underweight babies being delivered. The smoke that burns off the end of a cigarette and escapes into the air actually contains more harmful substances (tar, carbon monoxide, nicotine) than the smoke inhaled by the smoker.
So pregnant mothers-to-be, stay on the straight and narrow. At least for the nine months.