Update: trends in fetal alcohol syndrome--United States, 1979-1993.

Fetal alcohol syndrome (FAS) is characterized by a variety of physical and behavioral traits that result from maternal alcohol consumption during pregnancy. Features of FAS include prenatal or postnatal growth deficiency, characteristic abnormal facial features, and central nervous system deficits (1). Based on data from the national Birth Defects Monitoring Program (BDMP) (2), the rate of reported cases of FAS identified among newborns in the United States during 1979-1992 increased approximately fourfold (2). This report updates data characterizing the occurrence of FAS through 1993, the latest complete year of data reporting for BDMP.