Abusus non tollit usum

If you are irresponsible it's still your fault. Emotion-ridden proposals to sue alcohol-producing companies for fetal alcohol damage are beyond laughable, particularly so when coming from a healthcare professional.

Mothers who abuse alcohol and drugs during pregnancy are behaving irresponsibly because they disregard the consequences, ergo they don't give a damn about the life they are carrying and destroying within. Feed me no nonsense about it being society's fault, if you drink or shoot up it's still you doing it and no-one is forcing you to. When someone wants to destroy themselves, take alcohol away from them and they will find other ways to throw their lives in the bin, like hard drugs or stabbing others for fun. Because we can't expect booze sellers and producers to take such lawsuits lightly; they will simply pack up shop and move their business to higher health professional IQ areas.

Truth is we can't eliminate or reliably prevent FASD. Education and awareness campaigns can only go as far as the recipient's common sense can take them. Irresponsible mothers will keep popping hard liquor and babies, in that order, while social services will keep popping in to take the kids away and give them to more deserving families. All we can do is jail mums whose children have FASD, inventing a crime of alcohol abuse during pregnancy. Where would that take us?

Booze is great, as myself and many other happy responsible drinkers will no doubt vouch for. We support local businesses that produce and sell good liquor products, we have a great time and thus contribute both to GDP and HDI. The misuse of this resource is no reason to force a liquor price increase for companies to cope with pay-outs for someone else's stupidity. Moreover, the inevitable higher booze prices will push the addicts into either crime to procure the money or more accessible hard drugs. Now there we'd have a BIG problem.