All pregnant women should receive prenatal care without restriction, and all children should receive health care. The rest of the industrialized world doesn't understand us, because we don't do this. Working women should have standardized maternity leave policies to spend time at home with their newborns. Many work, even go back to work two weeks past delivery, because they will lose health care benefits. Getting prenatal care, as I mentioned earlier, also should include childbirth and parenting classes, social services support, nutritional education, and access to rehab programs, not only for alcohol and harder drugs, but also for cigarettes.
Cigarette smoking is more common than alcohol and drug use.
Therefore, money put into treatment and prevention programs may be dollars saved over the lifetime of a child. Bonding of mother and baby often starts in early pregnancy, but first hearing and then seeing the baby really put the whole bonding issue in a new perspective. Ultrasonography impacts on bonding. Another way of encouraging healthy behavior could be providing for an ultrasound for all pregnant women between 15 and 22 weeks of pregnancy. In fact, the majority will be normal, and many abnormalities don't warrant abortion.