Pregnant women who are addicted to heroin and other opiates give birth to heroin addicts. With the unstoppable rise of heroin and opioid abuse in the U.S., the only way to go is to find a better treatment for babies who were deprived of the choice to refrain from opioid addiction and drug dependence.
In an event that a pregnant woman ingests alcohol or drugs during pregnancy, the ingested substance is most likely to be delivered to the baby through the placenta. Most cases of pregnant women who regularly abuse drugs like heroin and other opioids turn their children into drug addicts as well.
An instant abstinence from the substance will also be very harmful to the mother and child. Quitting instantly during pregnancy could cause a miscarriage, high risk of relapse and fatal overdose. The severity of the newborn's dependence on mother's opioid supply is so strong that when the umbilical cord is cut after delivery, the infant could suffer withdrawal symptoms after a few minutes.
The Magee-Womens Hospital of University of Pittsburg Medical Center initiated a Pregnancy Recovery Center in 2014 amidst the rising admission of pregnant heroin addicts. The hospital has recorded 350 confirmed cases of pregnant heroin addicted patients in 2012. In the U.S. alone, a baby suffering from opioid withdrawal is born every 25 minutes, according to the National Institute on Drug Abuse
The hospital has created a treatment program that gradually removes both the mother and child's dependence on the drug, CBS News cited. The program uses Buprenorphine, a drug that satisfies the opioid fix but does not cause a euphoric high state to the patient.
In 2015, the Protecting Our Infants Act was enacted. This federal law authorized the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention to collect data and make a consensus of the population of newborns with dependence to opioids. The data collected will be used by the US Department of Health and Services to develop recommendations to best prevent and treat drug dependence for pregnant women and newborn babies.
Through the Buprenorphine treatment, two-thirds of newborns with drug addicted mothers were saved from drug dependence. But even with the availability of a treatment to newborn opioid withdrawal, the best way to approach the situation is to refrain from any form of substance abuse before, after and during pregnancy.
