Thought I would share this article from today’s New York Times:

‘Pregnant? Want a glass of wine?

A study released today in The Journal of Epidemiology and Community Health suggests that might be just fine.

Using data from the Millennium Cohort Study in Britain, a data-rich look at 11,500 children born in the U.K. during the first two years of this century, researchers at University College in London concluded that the children of women who drank “lightly” — meaning up to one to two drinks a week — during pregnancy did no worse on cognitive tests at age 5 than children of mothers who did not drink at all. Actually, they did slightly better on the tests, which included things like “naming vocabulary,” “picture similarities” and “pattern construction.”

The children of mothers who went beyond “light drinking,” however, had noticeably lower scores.

This is not really news, of course, but rather codification (and a bit of specific detail) of what we already knew. Doctors have long said that a little is not a problem — the problem is defining “a little.”

Will this change your feelings about alcohol and pregnancy? Or will a pregnant woman holding a beer still set off your alarm bells?’

To link to this article and commentary: http://parenting.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/10/06/drinking-while-pregnant/