This morning there was a short news story about whether a child born with serious disabilities caused by their mothers alcohol consumption should be compensated as a victim of crime. The speaker went on to suggest whether mothers who knowingly consume alcohol during their pregnancies should or could be prosecuted if their baby is born with foetal alcohol syndrome. The argument is that it should be considered a crime, causing harm to another human being , yet the current argument is whether or not a judge, or indeed the law can consider a foetus an independent being.

The main argument against it was "if you criminalise women during their pregnancy for drinking alcohol during their pregnancy then women may not go to their Drs or may terminate an otherwise wanted pregnancy"

Now, I've never been pregnant, a number of my friends are now welcoming their first babies into the world and a few of them continued out on girls nights out, albeit swopping alcohol for soft drinks. The general consensus is that women avoid alcohol once they find out they are pregnant, a few may enjoy an occassional glass of wine or so but it is not that kind of drinking that brings on this syndrome.

I do not know much about foetal alcohol syndrome but I am going to be interested in watching how this plays out.
To me, if a woman knowingly continues to drink excessive alcohol whilst pregnancy, or uses illegal substances in such an excess that it causes physical and mental damage to their baby then yes they should face negligence charges at the least. Social services, child protection should be able to use these cases to be able to monitor and if needed remove the infant from the parents.

However my concern is syndromes like foetal alcohol syndrome include symptoms like narrow eyes, thin upper lips, these physical symptoms can be picked up immediately, but the chances at that point of misdiagnosis would be a concern to me. Particularly when you know that actually, the development of a babies face is during the first term of pregnancy, well, some women dont even know they are pregnant then. How is it to be policed? In this modern day with records too frequently being ill-kept I wonder how they intend to keep on top of their already growing work loads.

I agree in point, but in terms of measuring the long term effects on a baby born with foetal alcohol syndrome, would take weeks to months, so what are they suggesting? To treat giving birth to a baby with foetal alcohol syndrome as a crime, prosecute the mother and then what? Remove the baby into foster care until they can determine what damage is there and then? Return the baby or does the mother then loose the baby?

What do you think?

http://www.bbc.com/news/health-29614413