The National Council on Alcoholism and Drug Dependence (NCADD) has designated May 14-20, 2012 as NCADD Alcohol and Other Drug-Related Birth Defects Awareness Week. Unfortunately, it probably won’t make the morning talk show circuit even though Fetal Alcohol Spectrum Disorders (FASD) represent the leading known cause of preventable mental retardation in the U.S.

FASD can occur anytime a pregnant woman drinks alcohol. Research has shown over and over that there is no safe level of alcohol consumption during pregnancy. Even a single binge-drinking episode (having four or more drinks on one occasion) has been associated with increased risk for learning disabilities in a newborn.

The biology is simple. When a pregnant woman drinks alcohol, it passes directly from her blood-stream to the placenta of the growing baby. When a pregnant woman drinks, her baby drinks too.

Prevention is 100 percent effective but sometimes difficult to implement:

• If you are pregnant, don’t drink alcohol.
• If you drink alcohol and can’t stop, don’t get pregnant.
• If you're pregnant and can’t stop drinking, get help.

I’m not suggesting that we need marathons, t-shirts and wristbands to reinforce these points. We need something far more basic – the facts. They need to be stated clearly and consistently, over and over again in the same way we work to reduce and eliminate other preventable conditions.

Pharmaceutical and supplement manufacturers increase sales and profits (in part) by developing drugs to treat disease, and convincing people they need medications to prevent illness. While it is true that many drugs help people live longer, too many hurt people in ways they don’t realize. Today, failure to disclose the potentially harmful side effects of Rx drugs has become routine. The reasons are complicated and real.

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On the evening of Whitney Houston’s death, recording artist Tony Bennett asked the audience at Clive Davis’ Beverly Hills party to commit themselves to get the government to legalize drugs so people don’t have to buy them under the table from a “gangster.”

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