The influence of alcohol on genetics and offspring. The effect of alcohol on offspring The detrimental effect of alcohol on offspring

Harm of alcohol

In ancient Russia there was a wonderful custom: during the wedding, the young and the young were forbidden to drink alcohol, since the resulting intoxication would be harmful to future offspring. What good fellows, isn't it? Psychiatrists say that the cause of neuropsychic diseases in children is alcoholism in the generation of the patient's parents. Medical practice confirms that hereditary diseases exist. And there are more than 500 such diseases. Sometimes only susceptibility to the disease is transmitted.

A child may be born with some kind of abnormality (whether physical anomalies) or a deviation in health occurs later (while studying at school, mental retardation or impaired vision.) When a child is born healthy, and the deviations come later, then the parents will blame everyone and everything, but not themselves.

And the fact that the father took alcohol in large quantities before the wedding, or the mother, carrying an unborn child under her heart, drank a bottle of beer?

Parents “forget” about this or treat such actions as proper actions. The verdict for all the actions and deeds of future parents is the same: it is alcoholic beverages that will seriously affect the health of future children. So, before you start "making" children, you need to think about your health and your lifestyle, and how they may affect your children in the future.

There is information from scientists that 15 dead children and 8 disabled children are born from 23 alcoholics. Even a one-time intoxication at the time of conception can be the cause of the backwardness of the unborn child and other serious illnesses.

Once French researchers wrote: “Alcohol fills half of our institutions for lunatics and almost entirely our prisons, it increases the overall mortality by 25-30%, gives 50% of tuberculosis; alcoholism of parents increases the mortality of children by 50%; drunkenness leads to the extinction of the nation.

When a woman is early dates pregnancy to be registered in a specialized medical institution, her doctors ask if she or the father of the unborn child smokes, drinks. This information is needed so that specialists can calculate in advance all potential threats to the health of the unborn child. They also warn and talk about the consequences of alcohol abuse before and after the birth of a child.

There is a known case when a mother drank strong alcohol (vodka) in half an hour, how to feed a child. And a healthy three-month-old girl died from terrible convulsions while intoxicated. Alcohol very quickly passes into mother's milk, after which the child becomes poisoned. There is one more example. A nursing mother drank beer to increase the amount of milk. Her child was ill with inflammation of the kidneys. It turns out that the systematic use of beer often leads to serious illnesses internal organs.

Drinking even a small dose of alcohol, we harm not only our health, but also the health of our children. Medicine has established that a small dose of alcohol affects memory and attention, the correctness and speed of actions performed.

In our era, a lot of women turn to doctors for help in planning pregnancy and conceiving a child. And in many cases, it turns out that the problem of childlessness is diseases caused by alcohol.

Doctors also receive many complaints from young people about impotence. The cause of unhappiness is alcohol. After all, alcohol, entering the bloodstream and all internal organs, weakens their functions. In addition, the influence of alcohol adversely affects male spermatozoa and the female egg. Under the influence of alcohol, they shrink, and sometimes they do not connect properly, which can lead to physical abnormalities of the fetus or to its death.

Some doctors say that alcoholism is not a hereditary disease. Only a society that surrounds a child from an early age, a bad example of parents, can lead to the fact that a son can inherit an addiction to alcohol.

Be attentive first of all to your health when planning a healthy child and be careful and prudent when raising your child. After all, alcoholism is not a hereditary disease, but an acquired one, so parents should take care and worry about all their children: born and unborn.

Even in ancient times, people noticed that children with various physical and mental defects are born from drunkards. The ancient Greek physician Hippocrates directly pointed out that the cause of diseases such as idiocy and epilepsy is the use of wine on the day of conception. In many countries in ancient times it was forbidden, under pain of severe punishment, to take strong drinks on the wedding day. The ancient Greek scientist and philosopher Aristotle stressed that female drunkards give birth to drunkards.

Recently, the attention of many scientists is increasingly attracted to the genetic aspects of alcoholism. There are such main ways of the negative influence of alcoholism of men and women on their offspring.

1. Teratogenic. The birth of a handicapped child as a result of a woman drinking alcohol on the day of conception or the first weeks and months of pregnancy. Alcohol, penetrating the placenta, can have a direct toxic effect on the cells of the developing embryo and fetus, causing various anomalies, called the alcohol syndrome, or alcoholic embryopathy.

2. Mutagenic. Various damage to chromosomes, stretching and tearing, the formation of ring chromosomes of germ cells as a result of chronic alcohol abuse by parents. For example, in the offspring, instead of two sex chromosomes, three are formed, which lead to the birth of a paralyzed and feeble-minded child.

3. Somatogenic. associated with injury and chronic diseases internal organs of alcoholic parents, which negatively affects the conception and development of the fetus.

4. Fetuses and infants develop alcohol addiction through the mother's blood and milk.

If the influence of the father on the fetus is determined by the change in chromosomes at the time of conception, then the development of the embryo after fertilization is more influenced by the mother's body. Saturated with alcohol and its toxic products of transformation, the blood of a mother who drinks alcohol during pregnancy easily penetrates through the placenta into the blood of the fetus, disrupts metabolism, which can lead to miscarriages, premature births, the birth of mentally retarded children and deformities.

According to statistics, complicated pregnancy is observed in 28% of women who drink alcohol; premature babies are born in 34, and dead - in 25%. Mortality in early age(up to two years) is 56% of children whose parents are alcoholics.

The effect of alcohol on a child is not limited to the prenatal period. Alcohol drunk by a nursing mother passes into milk and, entering the child's body, causes irreparable harm to him. In families of drinking parents, 43.9% of children die in the first months of life. The relationship between the drunkenness of parents and the birth of idiots has been found out. So, drunkenness of parents caused the birth of such children up to 33%.

Children born to drunkards, even if they don't suffer mental pathology, grow weak, capricious, unbalanced, touchy, sometimes gloomy, vicious, cruel. They often develop neurotic states, accompanied by tics, stuttering, bedwetting, sleep disturbance, and a sense of fear. Often neurotic states are fixed, become a stage pathological development personality.

Thus, the factors influencing the offspring are: toxic damage to the sex glands of alcoholic parents in chronic alcohol intoxication; acute poisoning germ cells at conception; intrauterine poisoning of the fetus in a mother who abuses alcohol; alcohol poisoning of an infant through milk.

It has been established that children born before their fathers became ill with alcoholism were overwhelmingly mentally healthy. Children whose birth was preceded by a long (4-5 years) period of alcoholization of their fathers had difficulty mastering the program of a comprehensive school and dropped out of school. Evidence suggests that children born to alcoholics are predisposed to drinking, but it is the conditions of upbringing that ultimately determine children's alcoholism.

Alcohol has a much stronger and more dangerous effect on the developing organism than on an adult. In the child's body, all vital systems are intensively developing. So, at primary school age, the formation of digestive system, drinking and regulation of the digestive departments and liver. Therefore, when drinking alcohol, the mucous membrane of the gastrointestinal tract is especially affected, parietal digestion is delayed, digestive enzymes are destroyed, and the process of absorption and assimilation of nutrients is upset. Alcohol enters the bloodstream, then the liver, paralyzing all its vital functions. At the same time, active liver cells that play a protective role in the body are reborn, as a result of which the child becomes susceptible to gastrointestinal diseases and Botkin's disease.

Somewhat later, the formation of the cardiovascular system, heart, capillary circulation, coordination of cardiac and vascular activity ends. During this period, alcohol especially strongly affects the cardiovascular system, which leads to myocardial dystrophy, a persistent increase in blood pressure, which can be preserved in the adult body. In children of middle school age, when the size and shape increase especially sharply chest, the vital capacity of the lungs doubles (from 1400 ml to 2800 ml), the pectoral muscles and muscles of respiration regulation develop, the lung tissue grows, drinking alcohol and smoking especially contributes to the development inflammatory processes(tracheitis, bronchitis) and other pulmonary diseases. At the same time, the transfer of gases by the blood is disturbed, since alcohol destroys the blood cells, inhibiting phagocytosis, and delays the active activity of the hematopoietic organs. Therefore, drinking teenagers show anemia, headaches, the work of the brain and heart worsens.

During the formation of the reproductive system frequent use alcohol delays the development of the reproductive system and muscle strength. An increase in the sexual excitability of adolescents during intoxication dulls logical thinking, introspection and consciousness of behavior. This contributes to casual early sexual intercourse, the manifestation of violence and promiscuity. In addition, chronic alcohol consumption at this age can lead to early impotence.

At senior school age, physical development ends, but due to acceleration, the formation of the psyche lags behind. In the cerebral hemispheres, the zone of synthesis is still being improved - processing and evaluating information, speech generalization, analysis and integration. Personal and social motivations, interests in work, professions, goals in life are uncertain, unstable, moral and volitional qualities are still being formed. Alcoholism has a fatal effect on the psyche of young men and women due to damage to the centers of the brain, in which the analysis of action, control of behavior takes place, coordination of the mental, emotional and motor spheres is carried out. It is these areas of the cerebral cortex that are paralyzed by alcohol first of all and more strongly than all other departments. Not only their functions, the nature of biocurrents change, but also the morphological structure.

In senior school age, alcoholism quickly leads to violations of discipline and law and order, hooliganism and promiscuity, and ultimately to the degeneration of the student's personality, juvenile psychosis.

In families of alcoholics, where there is no sincerity in relationships, friendliness between family members, so-called difficult teenagers are most often formed who are prone to delinquency and commit immoral, antisocial acts. A bad example of parents, everyday drinking in the family, neglect, loneliness create favorable conditions for the consumption of alcoholic beverages by children and adolescents. It should be remembered that taking even small doses of alcohol can cause an irresistible constant craving for it.

Russian Federation

State educational institution

secondary vocational education

"Oryol Basic Medical College"

The effect of alcohol on offspring

Performed

student 12 m/s group

A.V.Gryadunova

Orel - 2009

The effect of alcohol on offspring

Alcohol destroys more than just the brain. It acts just as detrimentally on reproductive tissues, on germ cells and on offspring. And that means he's ruining the future.

alcohol consumption for offspring goes in two directions: the first is that alcohol consumption is accompanied by profound changes in the genital area, including atrophy of the reproductive organs.

The second way alcohol acts is its direct action on the germ cell. When a person is intoxicated, all the cells of his body are saturated with ethyl poison, including germ cells. Germ cells damaged by alcohol cause the onset of degradation. Even worse, if another (female) cell turns out to be alcoholized upon fusion, then in the embryo there will be an accumulation of degenerative properties, which is especially hard on the development of the fetus, on the fate of the child.

alcohol "drinks" are reflected in the genetic substrate, which can lead to the birth of defective offspring, if not immediately, then in subsequent generations. The intake of alcohol by women has a particularly significant effect on offspring. At the same time, for the appearance of degenerative offspring, it is not at all necessary that the parents be alcoholics. And the catastrophically growing number of handicapped and mentally retarded children confirms this. Born from drunken parents, mentally retarded people inevitably produce the same offspring, and there is an ever-increasing decline in the intellectual level of the people.

Both acute and chronic alcohol poisoning are extremely detrimental to the germ plasm. Under the influence of alcohol, the internal elements of the germ cell undergo profound changes that give rise to hereditary degenerations or degenerations.

If a man, as a result of his father's alcoholism, has become demented or epileptic, then he shows a tendency to pass on his dementia or epilepsy to descendants, although he himself may not drink alcohol at all.

Nowadays, medicine already knows for certain that if conception occurred during a period when the germ cell was in a state of "intoxication", then children are very often born mentally or physically defective. Nine thousand idiots were examined in Switzerland. It turned out that they were all conceived either at Maslenitsa or during the grape harvest, when people drink especially a lot. It is the protection of the unborn child that underlies the glorious ancient tradition, according to which it is not customary for the bride and groom to drink wine at the wedding. Alcohol and newlyweds - this is not compatible in any doses, under any conditions.

D. I. Mendeleev, S. P. Botkin, I. M. Sechenov, I. P. Pavlov, V. M. Bekhterev - conducted a study of the effect of alcohol on living organisms and became convinced of the enormous harm it causes to all living things. Pregnant guinea pigs for some time they were given small portions of alcohol. Of the 88 cubs born by them, 54 died immediately after birth. A little vodka was added to the food of a pregnant dog in the last three weeks before giving birth. The dog had six puppies, but three of them turned out to be dead, and the rest were frail and sick.

For the artificial breeding of chickens, 160 eggs were placed in a barn, under which there was a room for the distillation of alcohol. By the time only half of the chickens appeared, 40 of them died, and 25 hatched ugly, with disfigured beaks, without claws. But here there were only vapors of alcohol that passed through the thickness of the floor, and the embryos were protected by the shell. What an insignificant amount of this poison could reach the fetus, and this was enough to get such consequences. In an experiment on rabbits, prolonged alcoholization of males led to selective brain pathology in offspring, which was expressed in a decrease in brain mass. Currently, alcohol is considered the most toxic poison known to the human fetus.

Studies have shown that men who systematically consume alcoholic "drinks" experience profound anatomical changes both in the reproductive organs themselves and in the germ cells. The latter are deformed, their number, activity and viability are impaired. The function of hormonal elements is also perverted. There is a sharp dissonance between the libido that has increased at first and physical capabilities, which brings discord into family life. In the future, the potentialities weaken, and then completely stop.

This issue was discussed at one of the sessions of the Academy of Medical Sciences Russian Federation. Scientists have demonstrated the germ cells of long-term drinkers under a microscope. Almost all of them were mutilated: now with a large deformed head, then, on the contrary, very small, the nucleus of different sizes, with corroded contours, sometimes little, sometimes a lot of protoplasm. Almost no normal cells were visible. Is healthy offspring possible in the presence of such gross changes in the germ cells?

If the consumption of alcohol by a man will inevitably have a negative impact on the offspring, then the woman brings death to the future many times more.

As a result of a survey of one and a half thousand mothers and their children, deviations from the norm were observed in 2% of children born to mothers who did not drink alcohol at all. This figure increased to 9% among children of "moderate" drinking mothers (deviations from the norm were observed 4.5 times more often in those who drank "moderately"). In children whose mothers drank heavily, the rate of deviation from the norm rose to 74%. Moreover, the latter, as a rule, recorded not one, but several deviations from the norm. It is on fruits, on children whose defense mechanisms are still very weak, that the poisoning effect of alcohol is especially detrimental.

Thus, changes in the germ cells, as well as the poisoning of the body with alcohol, often lead to the appearance of degenerative offspring. But in parallel with changes in the physiology of hormones, there are gross changes in the psyche regarding the intimate side of the life of spouses. Normal relationships between them are disrupted, pathological jealousy appears, which takes ugly forms and turns family life into hell.

Where there is a systematic consumption of alcohol by at least one of the parents, there is a high probability of the appearance of offspring with severe mental changes. The birth of a defective child not only deprives this unfortunate child of the joy of life, but also makes parents unhappy for many years, and even for life, poisoning the entire way of life of the family. The fact is that a child with pathological deviations, up to complete idiocy, parents love no less, and maybe more than normal child. This is where pity and guilt come in.

Children with severe mental disorders (idiots, epileptics) are a lifelong burden on the shoulders of parents and society. And the higher the per capita consumption of alcohol in the country, the more defective offspring are born, which inevitably leads to the degeneration of the nation.

There is compelling evidence about the influence of alcohol on the appearance of idiots. So, in France back in 1880-1890. it was found that out of 1000 idiotic children, 471 had fathers who were drunkards, 84 had mothers, and 65 had both parents. No information was obtained from 170 idiots, and only 209 parents were not drunkards, in any case, they did not admit it. These are terrible numbers. The fact that children conceived in a state of intoxication can be born idiots was already known in antiquity, but no one thought about such a high percentage.

Sources of information:

Uglov FG Man among people.

Uglov F. G. Suicides.

Humanity has long known about the harmful effects of alcohol on offspring. So, in ancient Sparta, there was a law that forbade newlyweds to drink wine on their wedding day. AT Ancient Rome they said: “Drunkens give birth to drunkards” and generally forbade drinking until the age of 30, i.e. until the age when men start families. The ancient Greek philosopher Plato sought the introduction of a law according to which it was strictly forbidden to drink before the age of 18, i.e. before the maturation of the organism. There was a law in Carthage forbidding the drinking of wine on the days when conjugal duties were performed. The character of ancient Roman mythology, Vulcan, was born with a lame leg, since Jupiter was drunk at the time of conception.

Large statistical data have now been accumulated on the harmful effects of alcoholism on offspring. For example, the Bulgarian doctor G. Efremov, long time observing 23 chronic alcoholics, recorded 15 stillborns and 8 deformed children in their families. French scientists, using a large statistical material, proved that the maximum number of stillborns was conceived during carnivals and the celebration of the harvest of young wine. Even the term "children of carnivals" appeared. Of course, not all of the parents mentioned here were chronic alcoholics. It's all about "drunken conception."

It has been established that only 5% of mentally retarded children studying in the so-called auxiliary schools have parents suffering from chronic alcoholism; healthy people”, but, however, do not disdain alcohol.

In the 19th century female drunkards were extremely rare. But already in the middle of the XX century. they were included in the total number of alcoholics. At the same time, WHO notes a trend towards an increase in the proportion of women alcoholics. Alcoholism in women leads to more serious consequences: it is more difficult to treat than in men; with alcoholism, a pregnant child may be hereditarily defective, damage to its central nervous system. In addition, the child suffers from the lack of a calm and friendly environment at home.

Experimental studies have shown that alcohol primarily affects germ cells, which subsequently carry pathological information to the unborn fetus. Sex cells, deformed, develop incorrectly, and subsequently they cannot be “corrected” by any means. pharmacological means. Cases when quite normal children are born to chronic alcoholics do not prove the harmlessness of parents' alcoholism, but only indicate that the drunkenness factor acts in conjunction with a large number of favorable and unfavorable factors. Currently, a number of researchers have shown that chronic alcoholics can have healthy children only 2-3 years after abstinence from drinking alcohol. Otherwise, even with the most “super-sober conception”, troubles cannot be avoided.

Sometimes chronic alcoholics give birth to children who do not have deviations in mental development. But it has been proven that 94% of children weighed down by alcoholic heredity subsequently become drunkards themselves or acquire mental disorders. So, French scientists conducted a unique experiment. They carefully followed the lives of four generations of patients suffering from chronic alcoholism. In the first generation - moral depravity, alcoholic excesses; in the second - drunkenness in the full sense of the word; representatives of the third suffered from hypochondria, melancholy, were prone to murder; in the fourth - stupidity, idiocy, barrenness, i.e., in fact, the genus ceased to exist.

The harmful effect of alcohol on offspring depends not only on biological causes, but also on social factors. The adverse social impact of parents' alcoholism on the development of their children is associated with violations of the psychological relationship between them. Any member of the family who lives next to an alcoholic is in a state of psychological stress. A particularly difficult psychological situation arises in a family where the mother is ill with alcoholism, although, of course, the father's alcoholism also has an extremely unfavorable effect on the psychological development of the child.

The unfavorable conditions of upbringing in the family of rich parents determine the slow formation of the communicative-cognitive activity of children at an early age. As a rule, such children experience severe learning difficulties, which are due, on the one hand, to pathological condition their nervous system, and the other - pedagogical neglect.

Conflict experiences lead to various forms misbehavior in children, primarily to protest reactions. Such reactions occur when one of the parents has alcoholism. The child strives to do everything out of spite, does not fulfill the requirements of adults, becomes aggressive, gloomy, unfriendly. Along with active reactions of protest, passive reactions are also possible when a child drops out of school, tries to avoid meetings with a drinking father, hides, and is afraid to go home. The child has neurotic disorders: sleep disturbance, tearfulness, resentment, tics, stuttering, bedwetting are sometimes observed. A sharper manifestation of protest is suicide attempts (suicide), which are based on an overly expressed feeling of resentment, a desire to take revenge on the offenders, to scare them.

One of the causes of deviant behavior in children with family alcoholism is imitation behavior. It is known that children imitate educators, parents, and they imitate such forms of asocial behavior of alcoholic parents as foul language, hooliganism, petty theft, smoking, alcohol and drug use.

A characteristic feature of the behavior of children in a family of alcoholics is motor disinhibition, or hyperdynamic syndrome. These children from an early age are characterized by motor restlessness, restlessness, lack of focus, impulsivity. In all cases, violations of the concentration of active attention are expressed. Such deviations of behavior are usually combined with irritability, a tendency to mood swings, sometimes aggressiveness and negativism, monotony of behavior, inability to complete any work begun.

All these mental states can become the basis for introducing adolescents to alcoholism and drug addiction. In the absence of medical and psychological correction, pedagogical neglect increases, behavioral disorders intensify, and children lose interest in learning at school.

3. Somatogenic. It is associated with injuries and chronic diseases of the internal organs of alcoholic parents, which negatively affects the conception and development of the fetus.

4. Fetuses and infants develop alcohol addiction through the mother's blood and milk.

According to statistics, complicated pregnancy is observed in 28% of women who drink alcohol; premature babies are born in 34%, and dead - in 25%. Mortality at an early age (up to two years) is 56% of children whose parents are alcoholics.

Children born from drunkards, even if they do not suffer from mental pathology, grow up weak, capricious, unbalanced, touchy, sometimes gloomy, vicious, cruel. They often develop neurotic states, accompanied by tics, stuttering, bedwetting, sleep disturbance, and a sense of fear. Often, neurotic states are fixed, becoming a stage in the pathological development of the personality.

Thus, the factors influencing the offspring are: toxic damage to the sex glands of alcoholic parents in chronic alcohol intoxication; acute poisoning of germ cells during conception; intrauterine poisoning of the fetus in a mother who abuses alcohol; alcohol poisoning of an infant through milk.

It has been established that children born before their fathers became ill with alcoholism were overwhelmingly mentally healthy. Children whose birth was preceded by a long (4-5 years) period of alcoholization of their fathers had difficulty mastering the curriculum of a general education school and dropped out of school. Evidence suggests that children born to alcoholics are predisposed to drinking, but it is the conditions of upbringing that ultimately determine children's alcoholism.

Alcohol has a much stronger and more dangerous effect on the developing organism than on an adult. In the child's body, all vital systems are intensively developing. So, at primary school age, the formation of the digestive system, drinking and regulation of the digestive departments and the liver are completed. Therefore, when drinking alcohol, the mucous membrane of the gastrointestinal tract is especially affected, parietal digestion is delayed, digestive enzymes are destroyed, and the process of absorption and assimilation of nutrients is upset. Alcohol enters the bloodstream, then the liver, paralyzing all its vital functions. At the same time, active liver cells that play a protective role in the body are reborn, as a result of which the child becomes susceptible to gastrointestinal diseases and Botkin's disease.

Somewhat later, the formation of the cardiovascular system, heart, capillary circulation, coordination of cardiac and vascular activity ends. During this period, alcohol especially strongly affects the cardiovascular system, which leads to myocardial dystrophy, a persistent increase in blood pressure, which can persist in the adult body. In children of middle school age, when the size and shape of the chest increase especially sharply, the vital capacity of the lungs doubles (from 1400 ml to 2800 ml), the pectoral muscles and muscles of respiration regulation develop, lung tissue grows, drinking alcohol and smoking especially contributes to the development inflammatory processes (tracheitis, bronchitis) and other pulmonary diseases. At the same time, the transfer of gases by the blood is disturbed, since alcohol destroys the blood cells, inhibiting phagocytosis, and delays the active activity of the hematopoietic organs. Therefore, drinking teenagers show anemia, headaches, the work of the brain and heart worsens.

During the formation of the reproductive system, frequent alcohol intake delays the development of the reproductive system and muscle strength. An increase in the sexual excitability of adolescents during intoxication dulls logical thinking, introspection and consciousness of behavior. This contributes to casual early sexual intercourse, the manifestation of violence and promiscuity. In addition, chronic alcohol consumption at this age can lead to early impotence.

In families of alcoholics, where there is no sincerity in relationships, friendliness between family members, so-called difficult teenagers are most often formed who are prone to delinquency and commit immoral, antisocial acts. A bad example of parents, everyday drinking in the family, neglect, loneliness create favorable conditions for the use of alcoholic beverages by children and adolescents. It should be remembered that taking even small doses of alcohol can cause an irresistible constant craving for it.