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Katy Jo Fox (katyjofox@hotmail.com)
European Studies-Europe
European Symposium
Final Draft
2/25/1999


What is Fetal Alcohol Syndrome?

Fetal Alcohol Syndrome (FAS) is an irreversible birth defect caused by a mother drinking during pregnancy. There are three criteria for full-blown FAS. "(1) Pre- and/or postnatal growth deficiency; (2) a distinct pattern of specific malformations including characteristic facial features; and (3) central nervous system dysfunction, evidenced by developmental delay, hyperactivity, and intellectual deficits" (Streissguth; Challenge 3, 52). Diagnosticians vary in defining and diagnosing problems caused alcohol in utero. Traditionally, the other diagnosis given was Fetal Alcohol Effects (FAE), which is basically FAS without the facial features. Since most of the research presented in this report used the terms FAS/E, I will be using those terms to describe people damaged by alcohol. FAS/E is 100% preventable. The only way someone can have full-blown FAS is if their mother drank while they were pregnant. There have been studies to find out about the paternal involvement in FAS/E, but it is almost impossible to test, so I am only going to focus on the maternal involvement. It is not genetic. It is not something that can be "caught." It is the number one known cause of mental retardation. FAS/E can be found wherever women of childbearing age drink; there are no exceptions.

Isn't there a lot of alcohol in Europe?

Twelve and a half percent of the world's population live in Europe, Europe being defined as the countries from the Atlantic to the Urals, within the continent of Europe. Those twelve and a half percent consume fifty percent of the world production of alcohol (Gefou-Madianou Introduction). Vodka, Wine, Beer, Schnapps, Whiskey, Gin, and Champagne; they all come from Europe and most people know which countries are most famous for each of them. Stereotypes, rightly or wrongly, are inevitable. When most people think of Russia's drinking habits, they think of Vodka. Why? Does Vodka keep people from freezing in the winter? Is it because their water is polluted? Are they all alcoholics? According to one historian, "drinking habits of modern societies are, at least in part, determined by the old drinking customs" (Segal xv). The question that might be raised is just what were those drinking customs. In Russian, the diminutive of voda, which means water, is vodka. Author David Christian theorized that this might be echoing the Bible, where there are many of references of the Living Water. Ever since the 1500s, Vodka has provided a continual redistribution of wealth (Christian Intro). Drunkenness became more prevalent when Mead and Beer were replaced by Vodka (Segal 292). For most Russians, drinking was a means for pleasure, either as a way of celebrating an occasion, or by creating one in the event that there was nothing to celebrate. Others drank as part of a spiritual experience (Christian Intro), such as communion. Grand Prince Vladimir spoke of drinking as "being the joy of Russia" (Segal xxi). Others used alcohol to get away from reality. There is a joke in Russia of alcoholism being the middle stage between socialism and communism (Segal xxi). Why is that funny? Well, according to the Soviet People's Commissar for Public Health, "the Tsar made the people drink and held them in ignoranceThe worker or the peasant often did not have the opportunity to spend his leisure other than to get drunk and forget the nightmares of his dependent, slave-like existence" (Segal xvi). It is no wonder that Russians enjoy their Vodka!

In Boris Segal's book on the use and abuse of alcohol in pre-Revolutionary Russia, he quoted a document from the 17th Century that mentioned "it was not unusual for men and women who were drinking together to engage in sex in full view of laughing onlookers without any sense of shame" (Segal 35). Other sources stated that women were less likely to drink than men (Segal 35). People also used alcohol to deal with problems of a sexual nature (Segal 274).

In Russia, one of Gorbachov's first actions was to limit the availability of alcohol (Milner-Gulland 181). It did not carry through after his campaign ended, due to the fall of communism, for alcoholism is now on the rise (Reuters). "In 1993 the number of alcoholics in Russia rose by 40.8%. Alcoholism in women increased by 48.1%" (International). This shift is something Russians do not need right now. They have far better ways to spend their inflated ruble than on alcohol.

Wine is seen almost as a trademark for France. Alcoholism is now a serious problem there (Ardogh 124). The average amount a person drinks has dropped over 20% since 1951, but according to John Ardagh et al., the French are still the "world's heaviest drinkers after the Luxemburgers" (124). Germans also enjoy their beer. Consuming about 12 liters per year, Germany has the highest average of ethanol intake per capita (Streissguth; Challenges 203). Most Germans receive 6.7% of their daily nutritional needs from Alcohol (Kreutzig). I do not have a can of beer nearby to check the nutritional value, but I can hardly believe that it might be packed full of nutrients.

Nine out of ten people in the United Kingdom drink alcohol. On average, males drink eight pints of beer a week and females drink three. Between the ages of 17 and 25, the average amount consumed is higher. According to the Institute for the Study of Drug Dependence, in the United Kingdom "seven percent of men and 2.5% of women ages 18 or over get drunk at least once a week" (Alcohol). A child can be affected by just two nights of bingeing.

Why do so many Europeans drink? It is a social activity. Instead of getting together at a local Starbucks or Tully's, Europeans get together and socialize at the local bar, or pub, or even at home. Whether it be a really intense soccer game, company, or a nightcap to share with some neighbors, alcohol is a part of their lifestyle. Most Europeans that I interacted with did not drink to get drunk. They drank because they enjoyed the taste of alcohol and the relaxation it brought. They drank because it was a tradition. They drank because their culture raised them to drink. Young adults had their parties and enjoyed working towards intoxication, but that was only at parties. Around the house, or at school, beer was drunk in moderation. I do not enjoy the taste of beer, so when I was in Germany, I did not drink. Adults and youths alike thought I was quite bizarre, though adults did not make as big of a deal about it as the people my age did. To Europeans, drinking is no big deal. Everybody drinks. In Russia, there is no age requirement for purchasing alcohol. In Germany, sixteen-year-olds can legally purchase any alcohol that can be found in an American grocery store. After they turn eighteen, they can purchase hard liquor. Europeans have documentation that goes back nearly a thousand years, proving that alcohol was as much a part of their culture then as it is now (Davis 132). Another reason Europeans drink is because they want to lower their risk of heart disease. Studies have shown the reason behind France's lower rate of heart disease is due the red wine that they consume (Carvell 60). A different study showed that a bottle of beer at dinner yielded the same results (Runners 23). According to the Kaiser Permanente Medical Center in Oakland, CA, the results only occur in moderation (Runners 23). Telling an alcoholic that it is good to drink, or someone who has alcoholism in their family, might be too big of a temptation for them. People with FAS/E have a high risk of being an alcoholic. One of the best ways to keep them from becoming one is by discouraging them to drink at all. Some doctors are still encouraging pregnant women to drink a glass of wine a day to help them relax. This has got to be stopped!

Arkopharma, a company in California, developed a non-alcoholic pill that has the same phenolics, or protection agent, found in red wine. This company was sneered at by at least one writer of Fortune magazine, who titled his article about this extract "All of the Benefits, None of the Fun." Tell me, mister author, are you going to tell my sister and stepsisters that it is fun living in a world in which they are not understood? This company has provided a simple solution to a difficult problem. They deserve a reward for their creation, not condemnation. Another solution for dealing with this problem is chocolate. Fifty grams of chocolate has the same amount of phenolics as a glass of cabernet (Shepard 49). By encouraging alcoholics, their families, and women of childbearing age to take a daily dose of tablets or chocolate, instead of red wine, the pressures they might be feeling to drink could be avoided.

Not all Europeans drink. Alcohol is strictly forbidden in Islam, but there are some sects that allow people to drink in moderation (Zaib). Drinking among women was also taboo for a long time. Up until 1975, tipsiness in Spanish women was not seen as proper (Gefou-Madianou 74). I have talked with several Italians about this subject too. Most Italian women between the ages of 20 and 40 do not drink (Max; Ferrante). It is a matter of choice, not of law.

What is the history behind the awareness of Fetal Alcohol Syndrome?

Even before the time of Christ, people have known that drinking during pregnancy is not good. An angel of God told Manoah's wife that she should not drink wine or other fermented drinks while she was trying to conceive. Later on, she was blessed with Samson (Judges 13:7). In ancient Carthage and Sparta, laws prohibited newly married couples from drinking alcohol in order to prevent conception during intoxication (Tourmaa). One wonders why those laws were not adopted by other nations. It might have saved a lot of people from the pain of FAS/E. It has only been in the past few years that laws having to do with the prevention of FAS/FAE started being developed.

Starting in the 1720s, England experienced what was called the "gin epidemic" as a consequence of cheap, readily available gin (Hodgson et al. 166). Two million gallons of gin were said to be consumed in 1714. The yearly rate grew to 11 million gallons by 1750 (Report). In 1725, The Royal College of Physicians reported to the Parliament that parental drinking was a cause of "weak, feeble and distempered children (Tourmaa) who must be, instead of an advantage and strength, a charge to their country" (Report). In 1736 a report was submitted to Parliament:

The contagion has spread even to the female sex. Unhappy mothers habituate themselves to these distilled liquors, whose children are born weak and sickly, and often look shrivel'd and old as though they had numbered many years (Hodgson et al. 166).

Prior to the diagnosis of FAS/E, some doctors would write FLK in their notes, meaning Funny Looking Kid.

In order to try and reconstruct why the creation of gin became such a huge problem to society, I turned to my history book. During the early 1700s, in England, the crops started to fail at the same time there was the start of a major population growth. According to the concept of supply and demand, when the supply goes down, the demand does up, which usually leads to an inflation of prices. Every increase put more pressure on the peasants (Kagan et al. 596). Gin was cheap. If the English wanted to find a way to deal with the stress of that pressure, it is no wonder that they turned to gin. Although parliament raised the taxes on strong spirits in 1751 (Vaughan Bell), it was not until August 5, 1834 that the House of Commons' Select Committee on "Inquiry into Drunkenness" published a report titled "Effects of Drunkenness on the Nation" (Tourmaa).

In 1865, French physician Dr. Lanceraux described in detail what researchers now know is fetal alcohol syndrome. He wrote,

If an infant lives, he becomes idiotic or imbecile, and in adult life bears the special characteristics: the head is small..., his physiognomy vacant [peculiar facial features], a nervous susceptibility more or less accentuated, a state of nervousness bordering on hysteria, convulsions, epilepsy...
He concluded his report by stating that these characteristics were the inheritance given to children whose [parents] drank (Report).

Throughout the past, various studies found that children of alcoholics, or wet-nursed by an alcoholic, were abnormal. Many studies specifically dealt with the correlation between drinking during pregnancy and atypical children. In the late 1800s, a prison physician in England did a study on 120 female "drunkards" serving time in the Liverpool prison. He found that those who became pregnant were two and a half times more likely to have a stillbirth or an infant death than their sober peers were (Streissguth; FAS 36).

In France, 1901, a man stated in his doctoral thesis that "alcoholic mothers had a high proportion of spontaneous abortions, weak and poorly developed infants, early demise and epilepsy, and idiocy among their children" (Streissguth; FAS 37). Over twenty years later, in Zurich Switzerland, a separate study supported those findings (Streissguth; FAS 37). During 1931, an American by the name of Fretz reviewed studies done between 1870 and 1930 to see if there was any difference between the children of alcoholic mothers and children of alcoholic fathers. He only found two studies (Streissguth; FAS 36). In a medical thesis written in France during 1957, the writer concluded that "maternal alcoholism posed very grave dangers for the developing fetus and child" (Streissguth; FAS 37).

In a book about drinking in France that was published in 1965, the author stated that it seemed like children of alcoholics had a personality that was not conducive to marriage (Sadoun 108). People with FAS/E have to be taught "common sense." They have trouble with abstract ideas, like time and money. They are not able to rationalize cause and effect relationships, like getting in trouble for shoplifting. It is quite likely that the French author was dealing with FAS/E, and not just the notion of children of alcoholics.

During 1968, an experiment involving chicken eggs and alcohol in Romania was the first of many studies using animals to show what is happening to babies in the womb. The researchers observed deformities and growth deficiencies in the baby chicks. Later they did a study on rats (Streissguth; FAS 55). A French man named Paul Lemoine is given credit for positively identifying FAS. He published a report on it in 1968 and after he read about the research taking place at the University of Washington, 1973, he wrote the team a letter and sent them a copy of his report (Streissguth; FAS 25).

The question one has to ask is why it took so long for society to acknowledge and understand the concept of alcohol related birth defects, if so many generations of people in so many places around the world knew about the effects of alcohol in utero. There is no easy answer. Prior to the late 1960s, if the father was defined by society as an alcoholic, the whole family took on that identity too (Streissguth; FAS 72). The damage seen in children was viewed as a result of their "social conditions" (Report). Woman typically drank less than men did, and so people doubted that the "small" amounts they did drink would have an effect on their growing baby. In Sweden, Aronson started her search for information about FAS/E in 1974. She and Olegard determined that the environments of the children had no effect on their mental abilities and neuropsychological symptoms (Streissguth; FAS 73).

How do we know that FAS is a problem in Europe and what is the research being done there?

Western Europe

The easiest way to see if FAS is a problem in any given country is to check out what is in their literature. The Royal College of Obstetricians & Gynecologists states that 1. 7 per 1, 000 babies in the UK have FAS (Guideline). The other way to know if FAS is a problem is to see the research being down in Europe. In Spain, Consuelo Guerri investigated the damage done to the central nervous system because of alcohol in pregnancy. His findings state that the damage done to the central nervous system is the most "dramatic and permanent consequence of maternal consumption of ethanol" and that it can occur without physical defects (304). This study has important implications for the way people are awarded federal aid. It also explains why people with FAE sometimes seem to be more affected by alcohol than people with FAS.

A recent French study concluded that it only takes 1.5 oz of absolute alcohol a day to damage a fetus, yielding the same results as a previous study done in Seattle (Larroque et al., 295). Another follow-up study done in Switzerland, supported by grants from the German Research Council, concluded that these psychiatric disorders persisted over time (Steinhausen et al., 337). FAS/E is a problem in all cultures that have alcohol. Unfortunately, according to French doctor Philippe Dehaene, alcoholism and FAS are not an interest to physicians preoccupied with rarer syndromes (Streissguth; Iceberg 5). Doctors need to start paying attention to the things they can do something about. Any intervention is better than none at all. It is also the responsibility of citizens everywhere to be informed about the dangers of drinking during pregnancy, as well as to study the effect alcohol has on a growing baby.

Northern Europe

Doctors in Sweden started their own FAS/E research soon after the team in Seattle published their article on FAS. In 1979 Olegard detected FAS in one out of 600 births and estimated that twice as many had FAE (Streissguth; FAS 46). Marita Aronson, also from Sweden, recently proved that children "displayed more frequent and severe disturbances" (323) if the mother drank all three trimesters.

The first Finnish child diagnosed with FAS was in 1979. In 1983 a campaign began in certain clinics to reduce the alcohol being ingested by pregnant women. Fifty-five out of the 85 reduced the amount of alcohol they were drinking by at least fifty percent. Most of the children born from these mothers had the same characteristics as those whose mothers drank their full term, but not to the same degree. Their basic finding was that it was never too late to stop. The sooner the mother stops drinking, the better off their baby will be (Streissguth 77).

Central Europe

In the early 1970s, shortly after the FAS research team in America coined the phrase Fetal Alcohol Syndrome, a German pediatrician named Hermann Loser also made the connection between alcoholic mothers and abnormal babies. He works diligently in his free time to try to diagnose and help as many FAS/E children as possible. He is interested in finding every physical characteristic of people with FAS/E (Loser; Conversation). It is through his research that we know that things like abnormal, stubby nails are typical for people with FAS/E. In 1975 he did a study using 336 subjects born to chronically alcoholic mothers. None of these subjects attended gymnasium, a college preparatory school that 39% of the general population attends (Streissguth; Challenges 204). In one of his more resent publications, Loser states that since the birth rate is now at 800,000, and since 1-2% of all women of child-bearing age are alcoholics, he predicts that at least 8,000 children a year will be born to alcoholic mothers. He also clarifies that a mother does not have to be an alcoholic to give birth to a child with FAS/E. He estimates that 2,200 children will be born with full-blown FAS every year. He writes that every year, approximately 80,000 German children are born to mothers who binge when they drink. Only 6% of all German women are completely abstinent (Loser 4).

Herr Loser is not the only German doctor to recognize FAS/E. The Berlin FAS Study, founded by Spohr and Steinhausen, started in 1977. The documentation and research that went into this study made it easier to detect similarities in the behavior, intellect, and physical characteristics of FAS/E as the children grew older (Streissguth; FAS 75). Unfortunately, as of 1996, there is only one other doctor in Germany actively involved in the research and prevention of FAS/E (Loser; Conversation).

When I was in Germany two years ago, I met an Austrian who was studying to become a doctor. He told me he was taught the fundamentals regarding FAS/E and so I gave him some information written by Herr Loser to read. I was happy to hear that he was taught almost everything that was in Herr Loser's pamphlet. Still, he expressed amazement when I told him that many people did not know that drinking during pregnancy causes problems. He seemed to think that Americans were the only people naive enough not to know. As an example of this, he pointed out the case of the lady suing McDonald's over hot coffee. We debated a long time about the incidence of FAS/E in Europe.

There is little data available about the rest of Central Europe. In Switzerland, every year between 170 and 205 alcohol-effected babies areborn (Blue Cross). With the help of some new friends in Switzerland, I found out that in 1997 there were 80,584 live births and 336 still births (Population). The incidence of FAS/E in Switzerland is with-in the norm. According to Dr. Philippe Dehaene, nobody in Belgium is working on the prevention and intervention of FAS/E (Streissguth; Iceburg 5). Knowing that Belgium is a mix of French and German culture, I have a pretty good idea about the incidence of FAS/E there.

Eastern Europe

Children being adopted from the old soviet states, as opposed to other countries, are the ones with the most likelihood of having FAS/FAE. According to the World Health Organization, although there is no hard evidence to substantiate this yet, FAS is more frequent in developing countries and among the poor (Guidelines; WHO). That might be one reason why the rates of FAS in Russia are higher. Prior to the fall of communism, a report was done on alcoholism that indirectly points to the prevalence of FAS/E. Segal included the results in his book. "About one-third of the contemporary Russian alcoholics have a first-degree relative [mom, dad, brother, or sister] with psychiatric problems and about 20% have a history of emotional and personality disorders prior to alcoholism" (Segal 294).

During 1974, a Russian physician named Shurygin published in a pediatrics journal a study about children born to alcoholic mothers. Fourteen children out of twenty-three were mentally retarded (Streissguth 71). Recently, one American went over to Russia and sifted through 131 medical abstracts. There were 17 that mentioned drinking during pregnancy and of those seventeen; two met the strictest criteria for FAS. The researcher goes on to write that Russia has the potential of having 20,000 babies born with FAS a year (International). These statistics are far above average.

In 1976, people in former Czechoslovakia did some important studies on mice that correlated the relationship between FAS and increasedaggressive behavior in social situations (Streissguth; FAS 64). Now researchers know the reason behind this correlation is that people withFAS/E have trouble filtering through noises and stimuli in chaotic situations, such as a party. Aggression is one way they show that they are insecure. This knowledge is a huge benefit for parents and teachers. Parents know that they have to avoid places where their children might become over-stimulated, and teachers know that they need small, orderly classrooms in order for a child with FAS/E to concentrate on learning.

What are Europeans doing about FAS?

Major prevention programs are active around the world, including Sweden and France. Their efforts are being rewarded. In France, within a period of 12 years, the prevalence of severe FAS has declined from one out of 690, to one in 1,004 (Streissguth; FAS 48). For the most part, the change in France is due to the social workers, psychologists, midwives, and educator's willingness to learn about FAS (Streissguth; Iceberg 4). The decline in FAS/E is even more significant in Sweden, where it has gone from 1 in 600 in the mid-1970s to 1 in 2,400 live-born infants in the mid. 1980s (Streissguth; FAS 48). One of the reasons for Sweden's success is the cooperation they have with their government. Out of all the countries in Europe, Sweden charges the most for alcohol and has some of the strictest laws pertaining to driving under the influence. As a result of these measures, which places them near the end of the line for the lowest drinking rates per capita, they enjoy being the among those least likely to die from cirrhosis of the liver in all of Europe (Gefou-Madianou 158). Sweden also has many programs specifically directed to FAS/E prevention and intervention.

In November, a conference sponsored by the Russian Federation Ministry of Health was held in Moscow. Dr. Ann Streissguth, who was on the Seattle's first FAS/E research team during the early 1970s, flew over to participate. She was invited over by people primarily interested in her knowledge of alcoholism, and so she was only given one opportunity to speak about FAS. Many people who attended her lecture wanted to learn more, but she was on a tight schedule. It was encouraging to hear first-hand about all the people who expressed interest in what she said (Conversation).

Germany is not having the same success. I had a long conversation with Herr Hermann Loser at the FAS conference in Seattle, 1996. He has tried and tried to provide a way to spread FAS awareness to Germans. He made two TV documentaries on it, but he is not allowed to show them on TV because of the rights of the child. He is not paid for the work he does on FAS. The government does not want to listen to what he has to say. Meeting him motivated me to want to become more involved with FAS awareness in Europe.

Some people simply do not want to see the damages that can occur because of drinking during pregnancy. I surfed into a recent study published in the British Medical Journal about the effects alcohol had on conception (Jensen). Even though I am convinced that Europeans are not as aware of FAS/E as the United States, I was saddened that there was no mention about the effect alcohol had on the babies. Prior to this study, in 1993, two doctors in England were given a grant to do a study about FAS. In the University of Southampton's report about the grant, they mentioned that only women who are heavy drinkers give birth to babies with FAS. Other sources say the same (Alcohol; Fact Sheet). Another report mentions that damage occurs after 15 units of alcohol per week, [a unit being a] pint of ordinary strength beer, lager, or cider, or a pint of strong beer or lager (Guideline). According to some friends in England, "regular" beer in the UK about 3-4% alcohol volume, and "strong" beer is about 5-8% (Farrell-Roberts). These are the resources the people in the United Kingdom look to for accurate health information. Something is better than nothing though, and at least Europe is starting to become more used to the idea of the existence of FAS. Even the European Commission is financially supporting a web site that has information about FAS in it (ALCOWEB).

Europeans need to be aware of the presence of FAS/E. It is in their own best interest to become aware of it. FAS/E is a community problem, not just a mother's problem. It takes the support of a community to raise a child with FAS/E. Sometimes people are being supportive and do not even know it, for it is their tax money, in some cases, that is doing the supporting. On average, in the United States, the lifetime cost for medical and long-term care for a person with FAS/E is 1.4 million US dollars (Fetal). Europeans cannot afford to neglect the prevention and intervention of a condition whose mere existence is entirely unnecessary.

What does all this have to do with me?

I have been doing research on FAS/E ever since my family and I made the connection between this form of retardation and my adopted sister. From the time I was 16, I knew that I wanted to somehow be involved in the field of FAS/E. I had a problem when I traveled overseas in 1994 though; I fell in love with Europe. When I was a freshman in college, I decided that there was probably a way I could be in Europe and do something related to the field of FAS/E at the same time, so my search began. I hunted through Seattle Pacific University's course handbook and designed my schedule around the courses I thought I might be able to use in the future. Budgeting time and costs, and balancing them against the courses offered by SPU, I decided to become a European Studies major. I have not regretted my decision.

I have benefited greatly from email and the Internet, for it is through these pieces of plastic and metal that I am able to start working on my goal of being an advocate for FAS in Europe. I am on a ListServ for people interested in FAS/E. Most of the people on it are parents. It is through this ListServ that I have made the acquaintance of people already working in Europe to spread the word about FAS/E. Two of those families are in Germany. Ann, a mother in Kiel, Germany, wrote me a long email about how her foster daughter was diagnosed and how she was doing in the German school system. She found a school that had small classes and enrolled her daughter there. Her daughter is now in a class with six other children and two teachers; an ideal setting for children affected by alcohol. The hospital in her area is quite supportive too (Ann; Wow). One reason she is able to get these services for her daughter is because she is not adopted, and so is under the control of Social Services (Ann; FAS). As in America, not all experiences with German social workers are good. In another email, she wrote that her friend's social worker told her friend, whose children also have FAS, that her children were just behind and that they would catch up by the time they turn 25 (Ann; Desparate). Germany has a long way to go in terms of FAS awareness.

There are FAS awareness activities going on in Germany, but as with Herr Loser, it is all done by volunteers. Ann is a member of a support group for parents of children with disabilities, and two of these children have FAS. She is also involved with a bi-monthly magazine dealing with children with disabilities, which often publishes articles about FAS written by doctors and parents. She wrote that in Germany there is a lot of knowledge about the damage smoking does during pregnancy, but that people are oblivious to the damage alcohol does (Ann; Wow). Germany is going to miss out if Ann decides to move back to England, her birthplace. In January she emailed her local TV station and asked if they would like to do a story on her daughter, who was in the hospital having a speech enhancement operation that needed to be done because of what the alcohol did to her in utero. The station agreed! None of the news crew had ever heard of FAS/E, and as one man flipped through a book on FAS, he was shocked to see the face of a boy his friends had just adopted. It was not the same boy, but it was the same condition. The boy was showing all the other signs of FAS too. After the taping, Ann had a long talk with him (Ann; TV). Another man from Germany on the FAS ListServ is Patrick. I was the one who, after seeing his web site on FAS, told him about the ListServ. He has access to the Internet at his job, and so he uses his web space for his various sites on FAS. I could not believe it when I first surfed into his site and found that it was university "affiliated".

Last year I discovered a web site called PlanetAll. PlanetAll is home to over 10,000 groups worldwide that anyone can join for free. I joined it because they had a group for people from my high school. Every three days PlanetAll would send me a list of 50 or so names of people who connected to people I was connected to and would ask if I would like to connect to any of them too. There were so many names that I got into the habit of only connecting to people with international sounding names. In November of `98 I was connected to 250 people I did not know. I decided to send them a message telling them about myself and about my interest in FAS. I then asked that they answer a couple questions like whether they knew about FAS prior to my email, if they knew anybody with it, and if they thought it was a problem in Europe. I received so many responses that I was hooked. I started surfing through international groups and connecting to them. In January I sent out a second letter, this time to 450 new connections. Most of the people who replied had no knowledge about FAS/E. It is a great feeling to know that I might be able to prevent a few children from being born with FAS/E.

I do not plan to spend all of my life in front of a computer, even though my friends might say otherwise. After I pay off my loans and earn enough for a plane ticket and lots of spending money for food and rent, I am going to go to Europe. According to the World Health Organization's European Charter on Alcohol, "All people with hazardous or harmful alcohol consumption and members of their families have the right to accessible treatment and care." The WHO Charter has been signed by Member States of the European Union (Alcohol; Fact Sheet). It is time for European countries to fulfill their commitments. I am hoping I can play a role in helping that happen. I do not know where I will end up, but knowing God's great sense of humor, I have a feeling that it will be in a non-English speaking country. I hope to find a doctor who is interested in the prevention of FAS/E and become the doctor's official FAS/E advocate. I feel that this is what God has called me to do. It is amazing to step back and see how everything has all fallen into place.

FAS Europe Member

Austria England Germany Ireland Luxembourg Netherland Norway Poland Romania Scotland