Dear all:

I want to mention some of the actual research about the effects on the baby from alchol ingestion 
of the mother.  The one flaw with only looking at milk transfer is that it doesn't go the second step 
- what happens to the baby.  Some chemicals have deleterious effects in much smaller quantities 
in infants than they do in adults - not just because of body size.  

One of the items that has been mentioned before on Lactnet and if I dug around enough I could 
probably retrieve a few articles on this - is that infants whose mothers ingest alcohol do not feed 
effectively.  They suckle longer and transfer LESS milk.   And that was from a moderate amount of 
alcohol.

For this reason, the Institute of Medicine recommends that it is OK to have the ocassional drink - 
one beer or one glass of wine and drink it right after feeding the baby so it clear the system 
before the next feeding.  They recommend pumping and dumping if more alcohol is consumed.

The other thing that you should keep in mind (because I had two mentors that would always say, 
when you don't feel high anymore the alcohol has cleared your system) is that alcholics don't feel 
the alcohol anymore.  We all trust that most of our mothers are not alcholics but that may not 
always be the case.

So, please don't go promoting rampant alcohol consumption - limited careful use is what I read 
from the literature as being OK.

Best regards, Susan Burger, MHS, PhD, IBCLC

             ***********************************************

To temporarily stop your subscription: set lactnet nomail
To start it again: set lactnet mail (or digest)
To unsubscribe: unsubscribe lactnet
All commands go to [log in to unmask]

The LACTNET mailing list is powered by L-Soft's renowned
LISTSERV(R) list management software together with L-Soft's LSMTP(R)
mailer for lightning fast mail delivery. For more information, go to:
http://www.lsoft.com/LISTSERV-powered.html