FIGURE 4.6
Trouble Ahead About half of U.S. women drink alcohol. That is not troubling, since occasional drinking in adulthood seems harmless. Most women stop drinking when they are pregnant. This is what almost all experts recommend, since drinking increases the risk of facial abnormalities in the first trimester and of brain damage throughout. The pregnant rates here are of women still reporting “any use” of alcohol in the third trimester. The data is frightening, since most neurons of the prefrontal cortex develop in the final months of pregnancy. Apparently, older is not wiser, and education does not lead to abstinence—quite the opposite. Since alcohol is a proven risk to the fetal brain, do 14 percent of older pregnant women suffer from alcoholism, unable to quit?