According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, men drink more, are more likely to binge drink and are almost four times more likely to develop alcohol use disorders than women.
But when it comes to diagnosing babies born with birth defects linked to alcohol use, such as fetal alcohol syndrome, historically only the mother’s drinking habits have been taken into account.
Research clearly shows that semen contains a vast amount of epigenetic information – that is, heritable shifts in the way genes are expressed that are not due to changes in the DNA sequence – that influence fetal development and child health. strongly influence. Yet most doctors and other health care providers fail to consider the influence of paternal health and lifestyle choices on child development.
I am a developmental physiologist and my research examines the ways in which male drinking affects fetal development.
While most attention is focused on maternal drinking during pregnancy, my team and I focus on male drinking in the weeks and months before conception. Our studies are the first to demonstrate that male drinking before pregnancy is a plausible but completely unexplored factor in the development of alcohol-related craniofacial abnormalities and growth disorders.
The intense focus on mother
In 1981, the U.S. Surgeon General issued a public health warning that alcohol consumption by women during pregnancy was causing physical and mental birth defects in children.
This warning came in response to growing recognition that a group of severe physical and mental disabilities in children, now commonly known as fetal alcohol syndrome, was linked to maternal alcohol use during pregnancy.
Today, doctors and scientists recognize that as many as 1 in 20 American schoolchildren may exhibit some form of fetal alcohol spectrum disorders, a term that refers to a wide range of alcohol-related physical, developmental, and behavioral disorders, many of which cause lifelong problems for those who are affected.
According to the CDC, this syndrome can occur when alcohol in the mother’s blood passes through the umbilical cord to the baby. This has led to the firmly held belief that alcohol-related birth defects are caused solely by maternal alcohol consumption during pregnancy and that this is the woman’s fault.
The medical community reinforces this perception by requiring pediatricians to require mothers to confirm and document their prenatal alcohol use before formally diagnosing children with alcohol-related birth defects or neurobehavioral disorders related to prenatal alcohol exposure. Nevertheless, there are several documented cases where children diagnosed with fetal alcohol syndrome were born to mothers who denied drinking alcohol during pregnancy.
For example, in one study, 41 mothers denied drinking alcohol during pregnancy, even though their child had been diagnosed with fetal alcohol syndrome. In these circumstances and others like them over the past forty years, the generally accepted assumption and explanation is that these mothers lied about their alcohol consumption during pregnancy.
According to the CDC, there is no known safe amount of alcohol to consume during pregnancy or while trying to conceive. Despite this recommendation, alcohol consumption during pregnancy is widely reported.
However, reported drinking levels are not directly linked to a child developing alcohol-related birth defects, and not all women who drink have children with fetal alcohol syndrome. This contradiction has resulted in conflicting public messages.
Although differences in how much and when pregnant women drink may contribute to the variation in how fetal alcohol syndrome develops, these factors alone cannot explain the wide range and severity of symptoms. Therefore, unknown factors beyond maternal alcohol consumption must contribute to this debilitating condition.
Dad is the missing piece
Alcohol is a social drug, so when women drink, they often do so with their male partner. From this perspective, my lab used a mouse model to determine what happens when mother, father, or both parents drink.
Fetal alcohol syndrome is associated with three basic birth defects: facial defects, including small eyes and mid-facial deformities; reduced growth of the head and brain; and fetal growth restriction, a condition that occurs when babies are born smaller than average. Building on a previous human study, we used facial recognition software to study the effects of alcohol consumption on the faces of mice born to mothers, fathers, or both parents who consumed alcohol before conception.
In a study published early this year, we created a digital image of the mouse’s face. We then digitally assigned facial landmarks, including specific parts of the eyes, ears, nose and mouth. The computer program then determined whether exposure to alcohol from the mother, father, or two parents changed the proportional relationships between each of these landmarks.
Our research in this mouse model showed that chronic alcohol exposure in males affects the formation of the brain, skull and face of the offspring. We also observed microcephaly, the underdevelopment of the head and brain, as well as lower birth weight, which worsened the more the male parent drank.
Therefore, our studies show that chronic alcohol exposure in men – defined as consuming more than five drinks per day within a four-hour period – could cause all three of the major birth defects of fetal alcohol syndrome.
Using the same mouse model, we also found that these craniofacial changes persist into later life. Specifically, we identified abnormalities in the jaw and the size and spacing of the adult teeth. Abnormal alignment of the upper and lower teeth is another recognized symptom of fetal alcohol syndrome in humans.
In addition to our research, other studies have identified behavioral changes in the offspring of male mice that regularly consume alcohol. Additionally, clinical studies suggest that paternal drinking increases the risk of heart defects in humans.
Effects on male fertility and pregnancy
Our studies also support the more direct effects of alcohol consumption on male fertility and the ability of couples to achieve a healthy pregnancy. These observations may be especially relevant for couples who are struggling to have children.
The CDC estimates that about 2% of all babies born in the US are conceived using assisted reproductive technologies. While the focus of in vitro fertilization treatments remains on maternal health and lifestyle choices, our studies show that alcohol exposure in men reduces the chance of becoming pregnant after undergoing IVF.
Significantly, our research found that the more a man drinks before releasing sperm, the less likely his partner is to become pregnant – in some cases by almost 50%.
Looking ahead
Annual estimates indicate that the cumulative healthcare and education costs of fetal alcohol spectrum disorders range from $1.29 billion to $10.1 billion per year. Given these exorbitant costs and the devastating lifelong consequences for affected individuals, ignoring fathers’ drinking habits in public health messages misses an important factor.
The first published studies on the effects of maternal exposure to toxins on birth defects in the 1950s and 1960s were met with skepticism and disbelief. Today it is widely accepted that maternal exposure to certain medications causes birth defects.
I fully expect that some within the medical and scientific community, as well as the public, will vehemently deny that paternal drinking matters. But until doctors start asking the father about his alcohol use, we will never fully know how father’s alcohol exposure contributes to birth defects and children’s health.
This article is republished from The Conversation, an independent nonprofit organization providing facts and trusted analysis to help you understand our complex world. It was written by: Michael Golding, Texas A&M University
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Michael Golding receives funding from the National Institutes of Health (R01AA028219) and a Medical Research Grant from the WM Keck Foundation.
