Article 54892 of alt.drugs: Xref: teetot.acusd.edu alt.drugs:54892 talk.politics.drugs:6893 Path: teetot.acusd.edu!network.ucsd.edu!ucsnews!sol.ctr.columbia.edu!howland.reston.ans.net!agate!linus!linus.mitre.org!newsflash.mitre.org!news From: [l--w--s] at [aera2.mitre.org] (Keith Lewis) Newsgroups: alt.drugs,talk.politics.drugs Subject: Re: What about Crack Babies? Date: 13 Dec 1993 23:04:10 GMT Organization: The MITRE Corporation Lines: 192 Message-ID: <2eisda$[h--i] at [newsflash.mitre.org]> References: <2eafr5$[g--a] at [news.utdallas.edu]> NNTP-Posting-Host: aera8700.mitre.org [g--e--r] at [utdallas.edu] (Dale M. Greer) writes in article <2eafr5$[g--a] at [news.utdallas.edu]> dated 10 Dec 1993 18:40:37 GMT: >I'm all for legalizing marijuana, benign as it is, but what about crack? >I have no experience with it, so I don't know if the stories I hear about >its addictiveness are truth or propaganda. There does seem to be quite >a problem with crack babies, though, and this is exactly the kind of >thing the pro-WoD people will bring up, and rightly so. > >My question, then, is this: if you are for the legalization of all drugs, >what is your answer to the question "What about crack babies?" "Crack babies", inasmuch as they exist, are the same old babies who were categorized as "Fetal Alcohol Syndrome" babies before cocaine became popular. It turns out that if you exclude mothers who use other drugs, babies born to cocaine users are just as healthy as those born to nonusers. Alcohol, tobacco, neglect, and general poor health that goes with poverty are the real causes of the cocaine syndrome politicians talk about so much. But could they ever blame the legal megadrugs? Noooooo; that would be political suicide. Old posts containing references to follow. --Keith Lewis [k--ew--s] at [mitre.org] "Mr. Cheap" I don't dance to music; music dances to me. Email me for my PGP key. The above may not (yet) represent the opinions of my employer. Newsgroups: talk.politics.drugs Path: linus!linus!agate!ames!elroy.jpl.nasa.gov!nntp-server.caltech.edu!manning From: [m--n--g] at [cco.caltech.edu] (Evan Marshall Manning) Subject: _Science_News_ on crack babies Message-ID: <[1991 Nov 14 230347 7446] at [cco.caltech.edu]> Keywords: cocaine crack premature baby babies Organization: California Institute of Technology, Pasadena Date: Thu, 14 Nov 1991 23:03:47 GMT Here's a new article on "crack babies" from _Science_News_, Nov 9, 1991. Clip and save! *************************************************************** "Smoking out cocaine's _in_utero_ impact" Despite many reports of cocaine's ill effects on the developing fetus, scientists lack definitive evidence specifically linking cocaine to adverse reproductive effects (SN: 9/7/91, p.152). Using a powerful statistical technique, a Canadian research team has found that cocaine by itself causes very few problems during pregnancy. Gideon Koren of the University of Toronto and his colleagues identified 20 previously published cocaine studies that in- volved pregnant women and yielded mixed results. Those studies often relied on small samples of cocaine users -- a problem that limited each study's statistical power. To home in on cocaine's reproductive risks, his team turned to a method called meta-analysis, which statisticians use to assess data by pooling a number of similar studies. Koren and his colleagues identified women in the 20 studies who used cocaine during pregnancy but did not use other illicit drugs or alcohol, and compared them with those who reported no drug or alcohol use during pregnancy. They found no statistical link between prenatal cocaine use and premature delivery, low birthweight or congenital heart defects in babies -- problems often thought to result from cocaine. The meta-analysis suggests that confounding factors -- such as other drugs, alcohol and smoking -- may account for the fetal growth retardation or prematurity commonly ascribed to cocaine, the researchers assert in the October _TERATOLOGY_. Koren says women who use cocaine tend to smoke more cigarettes than women who use other illicit drugs and are more likely to drink alcohol and take additional drugs. The meta-analysis did reveal a chance that a pregnant woman's cocaine use by itself might cause malformations of the genito-urinary tract in a small number of infants. Koren says this effect may trace to cocaine-induced constriction of the placental blood vessels. *************************************************************** <<<<<<<<<<<< Evan M. Manning ========== [m--n--g] at [gap.caltech.edu] >>>>>>>>>>>>>> Your eyes are weary from staring at the CRT for so long. You feel sleepy. Notice how restful it is to watch the cursor blink. Close your eyes. The opinions stated above are yours. You can't imagine why you ever felt otherwise Path: linus!linus!agate!spool.mu.edu!mips!cs.uoregon.edu!nntp.uoregon.edu!milton!lamontg From: [lamon t g] at [milton.u.washington.edu] (Lamont Granquist) Newsgroups: alt.drug,talk.politics.drugs Subject: Crack Babies Message-ID: <[1992 Jan 19 045246 4064] at [milton.u.washington.edu]> Date: 19 Jan 92 04:52:46 GMT Article-I.D.: milton.1992Jan19.045246.4064 Organization: Operation: Mindcrime Lines: 96 This was sent to me from an anonymous post -- I didn't type it in. (From _The Boston Sunday Globe_ * January 12, 1992, pg 69) (Permission to reproduce this article has not been sought) THE MYTH OF THE `CRACK BABIES' By Ellen Goodman They are called "a biological underclass" and "a lost generation." Those are just two of the milder name tags attached to the children we have come to believe were permanently damaged by their mothers' use of cocaine. The poster in maternity clinics conjure up the same image of the prenatally doomed: "Some people who smoke crack never get over it." The schools too have been put on emergency alert: "The crack babies are coming, the crack babies are coming." Indeed, the phrases "crack babies" and "crack kids" are shorthand for monster-children who are born addicted. These are the kids destined to grow up without the ability to pay attention or to learn or to love. But just when the name has stuck, it turns out that "crack baby" may be a creature of the imagination as much as medicine, a syndrome seen in the media more often than medicine. Three years after the epidemic of stories about these children began, six years after hospitals began to see newborns in deep trouble, researchers are casting doubt on the popular demon of the war on drugs. The very phrase "crack baby" is, in any literal sense, a misnomer. Cocaine is rarely taken by itself. It's part of a stew of substances taken in a variety of doses and circumstances. No direct line has been drawn from the mother's use of cocaine to fetal damage. Alcohol and tobacco may do as much harm to the fetus as cocaine. So may poor nutrition, sexually transmitted diseases, and the lack of medical care. Most important, it appears that the children born to cocaine-using mothers are not hopeless cases, permanently assigned to the monster track. Dr. Ira Chasnoff, who did some of the original work identifying the problem babies of mothers who took cocaine in combination with other drugs, has done a two-year follow-up study about to be published. It says, in his words, "Their average developmental functioning level is normal. They are no different from other children growing up. They are not the retarded imbeciles people talk about. This is not, he cautions, a green light for taking drugs during pregnancy. Drugs remain a serious health problem, and cocaine specifically contributes to premature birth and small head size. While the children in his study - children who have been offered some help - now function normally as a group, they are at risk individually. But, says Dr. Chasnoff, "As I study the problem more and more, I think the placenta does a better job of protecting the child than we do as a society." The need now is to widen the lens from nature to nurture, and from the environment of the unborn to that of the born. Another researcher who has taken a responsible second look at the "crack baby" syndrome is Claire Coles of Emory University. She believes these children, labeled by their drug of origin, are in fact "often victims of gross neglect, not brain damage." The worst damage that drugs may do is to the world a child inhabits after birth. Coles has a collection of horror stories about children growing up neglected, especially by cocaine addicts. One "crack kid" who couldn't concentrate in class was in fact hungry. Another poorly developed "crack baby" was being "raised" by a 5-year-old sister. The myth of the "crack baby" became a media hit, Coles believes, because "crack is exotic and happening mostly in `marginal' populations among `bad people' who are not like `us.'" It is easier to think about crack than alcohol or tobacco. There is more than a touch of racism in the attention. But perhaps the worst effect of this distortion is the sense of hopelessness dispensed with the title "crack kid." Hopelessness on the part of mothers, teachers, and even the children themselves. As Coles warns, "If a child comes to kindergarten with that label, they're dead. They are very likely to fulfill the worst prophecies." So, no more convenient and empty names. The children whose mothers used cocaine are neither universally nor permanently nor uniquely damaged. The so-called "crack kids" are just a portion of our growing population of children in deep trouble. They are only children, like so many others, growing up with a treacherous mix of nature's and nurture's woes. If you need a label, call them kids who need help. - Ellen Goodman is a Globe columnist. -- Lamont Granquist Disclaimer: if UW ever finds out what I post... [lamon t g] at [u.washington.edu] For quotes and other useless info see my .plan alt.drugs FTP site: milton.u.washington.edu[128.95.136.1] dir:/public/alt.drugs