Warning pregnant women over dangers of alcohol goes too far, experts say

Experts claim some mothers-to-be may even be having have an abortion due to worry about damaging their unborn child by drinking alcohol

Women are being unfairly alarmed by official guidelines that warn them to avoid alcohol completely during pregnancy, experts claim.

Some mothers-to-be may even be having an abortion because they are worried they have damaged their unborn child by drinking too much, it is claimed.

Related: Yes, we must listen to experts, but which ones? | Sonia Sodha

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Scanxiety: why private baby scans are on the rise

Many pregnant women are paying for extra ultrasounds, for reassurance or for ‘souvenir scans’. But does multiple scanning pose a risk to the unborn child?

Anxiety may be the scourge of our times, but it now appears we have “scanxiety”, too. According to a study of 2,000 women, the phenomenon of pregnant women paying for extra private scans is on the rise. Almost a third paid for scans during pregnancy, with 36% citing anxiety as a reason. The NHS offers routine scans at 12 and 20 weeks, although more may be given for medical reasons.

“For the last 20 years, it’s been quite common for women to access private facilities for scans,” says Dr Christoph Lees, a consultant in foetal and maternal medicine and obstetrics and a spokesman for the Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists. “Sometimes it’s simply for reassurance, or because they don’t feel they’re getting sufficient scans on the NHS. Sometimes they’re accessing a service that isn’t routinely provided, such as 3D and 4D scans. Many are what you might call souvenir scans.”

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Yes, we must listen to experts, but which ones? | Sonia Sodha

Heeding professionals is right, but what do we do when ideologies clash?

Britain has had enough of experts; so said Michael Gove during last summer’s Brexit campaign. It was a preposterous thing to say and I suspect Gove knew it. When it comes to matters of life and death, we crave the reassuring wisdom of experts. Even those of us who are frantic Googlers of symptoms deep down just want to be firmly told what the problem is and advised on the best course of action.

The very nature of what frontline professionals in our public services do – diagnosing us, delivering our babies, teaching our children – means they have enormous power over our lives. But what if they are not quite as expert as we would like to believe? After all, they’re only human. Insights from psychology tell us that we rarely make decisions based on rationally weighing up all the evidence – we simply don’t have the time. Instead, our brains rely on short cuts: gut feeling and instinct drive many of our choices, opening the door to the influence of personal values and irrational bias.

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Women aren't meant to talk about miscarriage. But I've never been able to keep a secret

Because of this silence, people don’t realise how traumatic it is – until it happens to them. I certainly didn’t

Last Friday, on a bright blue day, I took a train to south-west London. If you never go that way, and I generally don’t, I recommend it as a pleasant day trip: all those green spaces and cute patisseries and shops that only sell wraparound cashmere cardigans. I did not have time to linger, though, as I needed to get back to the office. But first I had to pick up a bag of ashes so small I could have put it in my jeans pocket.

Last month I had a miscarriage. I’d gone in for a scan that morning – another bright blue day – excitedly expecting to find out the gender of the baby. “Let’s see what we have,” the technician smiled. Unable to understand what I was looking at on the screen, I instead watched her face and I knew at once, as surely as you know the sound of a door slamming shut.

Related: 'There was no child, I told myself': life and marriage after miscarriage

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Royal Institution's new director Sarah Harper: we must show gold standard for science

Second woman to be appointed in RI’s 218-year history identifies role, in era of fake news, to supply trusted data across many issues from health to climate change and robotics

When Michael Faraday ran the Royal Institution, one of the oldest scientific organisations in the world, the 19th-century chemist took time to pile into public discourse. He ranted about dangerous pollution in the Thames. He debunked the fad of table-turning and blamed the educational system for allowing such nonsense to thrive.

Nearly 200 years later, scientists are still tackling bad thinking and big problems. For Sarah Harper, an Oxford gerontologist who takes the helm proper at the RI on Tuesday, the rise of denialism, fake news and alternative facts, combined with rapid advances in research that raise deep questions for society, mean that a grasp of science, and all its uncertainties, has never seemed more vital.

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Therapy ‘has long-term benefits for mothers with depression’

CBT has positive effects on mental health, financial empowerment and parenting skills, long-term study shows

Cognitive behavioural therapy has significant positive effects on a mother’s mental health, income, employment and parenting skills even seven years after the birth of the child, according to the first study of its kind.

The international research project into the impact of depression on pregnant mothers and their babies, led by Professor Sonia Bhalotra from the Institute for Social and Economic Research at the University of Essex, could have major implications for public policy.

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Experience: I had a free birth

We never extricated ourselves from the system; we just didn’t go for check-ups or scans

A free birth is one without medical assistance. For us, that meant no scans, no doctors and 58 hours of labour in our lounge: just me, my husband, Flynn, and our friend Claire.

I’m 32 and a yoga teacher, so yoga and mindfulness have allowed me to understand and trust my body. I’m also practical. I looked at all the things that could go wrong, then all the things that could go right – and chose positivity. I fell pregnant with our little girl, Fox, in May 2016.

Related: Experience: I saved a stranger’s life

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