It has long been known that alcohol and pregnancy can be a dangerous combination. Now, a new study from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention finds one in nine women reported drinking while pregnant.
Drinking patterns were broken down by trimester of pregnancy, with the study finding that nearly 20% of women drank in their first trimester. But it found this rate dropped to 4.7% of respondents in the second and third trimesters.
“Given that we live in a society that knows about the risks that come with drinking, it is alarming that this is a statistic,” said Dr. Jessica Shepherd, an obstetrician-gynecologist at Baylor University Medical Center in Dallas, who added that most women will stop after a positive pregnancy test.
The CDC report also observed specific drinking patterns such as binge drinking four or more beverages in one occasion, which was reported in more than 10% of respondents during the first trimester.
The study, from this week’s CDC “Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report,” highlighted data from the National Survey on Drug Use and Health (NSDUH), run from 2015 to 2018, that observed, among other habits, patterns of drinking and drug use in pregnant women.
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