Premature labor, low birth weight, birth defects – these are just some of the effects of drinking alcohol or smoking by pregnant women. Despite this, 11 percent. Polish women admit that while pregnant they smoked, and 14 percent – that he was drinking alcohol.
On Wednesday, the Ministry of Health and the Chief Sanitary Inspector presented the results of a nationwide survey on this subject. The study was conducted in June 2009 in 382 wards where women and newborns were detained. In total, about 3,3 thousand people were interviewed. women. The questions were answered not only by them, but also by the doctors and nurses who looked after them.
The results of the study indicate that at any time in their life 50% of people smoked. women; in the last two years, 36 percent smoked. of them, and almost every fifth (18%) smoked nearly 20 packets of cigarettes in one month in the last two years. Nearly 62 percent smokers quit smoking before or at the beginning of pregnancy.
17 percent women quit the addiction in the first trimester of pregnancy, and an additional 10 percent. in the second and third trimesters. 11 percent women continued smoking during pregnancy. Among smokers, 44 percent has primary education, 34 percent – medium, 36 percent – higher.
Over the past year, 50% of respondents declared alcohol abstinence. women of reproductive age. Among women who drink in the last year, almost every second drink beer (49 percent), 51 percent. drank wine, 14 percent spirit drinks.
Approx. 14 percent of all respondents and as much as 29 percent. women who drank alcohol in the last year also drank alcohol when they were pregnant (mostly women aged 29-34).
Using drugs at least once in a lifetime was declared by 4% of respondents. of the surveyed women, every hundredth admitted that she also took them during pregnancy. The most commonly used were cannabis preparations (marijuana or hashish) and amphetamines.
A downward trend was noted in the case of the use of sedatives and hypnotics by pregnant women. In 2009, 7,5 percent of these drugs prescribed by a doctor used it. of the respondents (in 2006 – 17%), drugs were taken without a doctor’s recommendation by 2,7%. women (in 2006 – 6%).
Meanwhile – as experts emphasize – the effects of drinking, smoking or using psychoactive substances during pregnancy may have disastrous consequences for the child. 11 percent women who smoke or who drank alcohol during pregnancy give birth to premature babies; children of female smokers are twice as likely to be born underweight (12%); drinking alcohol in 12% women leads to complications in the course of pregnancy; 20 percent children of female drinkers have an abnormal body length; 10 percent these children have a lower Apgar score; and 16 percent birth defects.
These are symptoms at the woman’s request – emphasizes prof. Anna Dobrzańska, a national consultant in the field of pediatrics, adds that any amount of alcohol during pregnancy can have a negative impact on the developing fetus.
At the moment, we are fighting for the life of a child with alcohol syndrome, whose mother also smoked, because it often goes hand in hand. The child has the full symptoms of alcohol-induced and post-alcoholic syndrome with the typical appearance of the mouth. We see these stigmas: a very characteristic mouth with no lip red, a flattened gutter. Such children also have neurological symptoms, they scream incessantly, are restless, sweaty, they need alcohol and nicotine, Dobrzańska told PAP. These children require both complex medical equipment and a pharmacological approach, she added.
Prof. Andrzej Poręba from the Polish Gynecological Society emphasized that one of the most dangerous moments is the very beginning of pregnancy; often a woman does not know about her condition yet, but smokes cigarettes or drinks alcohol. And this is the moment when the structures of the fetal organs are formed – by the eighth or ninth week, he said. We, as a society, should react immediately when we see a pregnant woman who smokes and drinks alcohol, he emphasized.
Health Minister Ewa Kopacz emphasized that thanks to the diagnosis of the problem, it will be easier to reach women and develop preventive programs. She added that mothers should be clearly conveyed the knowledge about how much they influence their behavior on the birth weight of the baby and its immune system; how much depends on them whether the child will be short or tall, whether he will suffer from respiratory tract more often or not.
I am ashamed – I am also a smoker, but I have to admit to one thing – when I was pregnant and then, when I was breastfeeding – and I was feeding my baby for a long time – I did not smoke – emphasized Kopacz. (PAP)