Is Non-Alcoholic Wine Safe to Drink While Pregnant?

There are many reasons for celebration throughout our lives. Landing a new job, seeing an old friend you’ve missed, tying the knot—no matter how big or small, there’s always a reason to celebrate. But perhaps, there are fewer reasons to celebrate quite as big as marking the arrival of a new baby into this world. And is there perhaps no gift from Mother Nature crueler than the fact that celebrating the occasion with champagne is a no-go for the mother-to-be? 

But today, if that mother-to-be wants to raise a glass to her almost-here bundle of joy, she has a growing number of options to celebrate sans alcohol. Is non-alcoholic wine safe during pregnancy? In this article, we’ll explore how alcoholic and non-alcoholic wine affects mothers during pregnancy. 

One quick disclaimer: What follows is general advice on the safety of non-alcoholic wine during pregnancy. However, if you are concerned about your personal risk for consuming non-alcoholic wine during pregnancy, please consult your doctor.

The short answer: It really depends. In general, doctors recommend avoiding consuming anything with alcohol during pregnancy. There is no accepted amount of alcohol that’s considered safe to consume while pregnant. So, you may be thinking, “Non-alcoholic means no alcohol, right?” Well, not exactly.

The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) does not consider “non-alcoholic” to mean “no alcohol.” Non-alcoholic beverages can contain up to 0.5% alcohol by volume (ABV). While 0.5% ABV would be considered a relatively trace amount of alcohol, because doctors recommend avoiding any and all alcohol during pregnancy, non-alcoholic wine is not recommended to be consumed while pregnant. However, not all non-alcoholic wines contain alcohol.

BEAU VIVA’s sparkling rosé has a 0% ABV, meaning that there is no detectable alcohol in the wine. When choosing to drink a wine that’s marketed as non-alcoholic while pregnant, be sure to first verify that the ABV level is indeed at 0%. 

Why Is Alcohol Unsafe to Drink During Pregnancy?

When you drink alcohol during pregnancy, you’re really drinking for two. After a pregnant person drinks alcohol, it travels through her bloodstream, where it’s carried into the fetus’s blood, tissues, and organs. And while that alcohol may leave the mother’s system fairly quickly, alcohol breaks down significantly more slowly in the fetus’s body, meaning that the blood alcohol level of the fetus stays high even while the mother’s goes down. 

Drinking alcohol during pregnancy has been shown to lead to developmental issues in the womb, causing birth defects and other long-term medical complications. It can cause a group of conditions called fetal alcohol spectrum disorders (FASDs). There are no known cures for any FASDs. Drinking a significant amount of alcohol can lead to what’s considered the most severe of these disorders, fetal alcohol syndrome. 

Symptoms of fetal alcohol syndrome include changes in the shape of the baby’s face, poor growth during pregnancy and after birth, poor muscle development, problems with movement and balance, speech issues, learning disorders, behavioral disorders, and heart defects. The child may deal with severe health complications throughout their life, such as cerebral palsy, and the mother may face premature delivery, pregnancy loss, or stillbirth.

If you suspect you might be pregnant or if you’re currently attempting to become pregnant, it’s a good idea to stop drinking alcohol immediately, as alcohol use seems to do the most harm to the fetus during the first three months of pregnancy. That said, there is no good time to consume alcohol while pregnant, and you should consider avoiding it throughout your pregnancy.

Celebrate Your New Arrival Safely

For a mother, there are few moments of joy greater than the moment they learn they’ll be bringing new life into this world. Celebrate your joy your way, keeping your baby safe without compromising on taste. Non-alcoholic wines aren’t all made the same and are not all safe for consumption during pregnancy. But BEAU VIVA’s zero-alcohol sparkling wine is.

Crafted by expert winemakers and made from carefully selected grapes from the South of France, BEAU VIVA’s zero-alcohol sparkling rosé undergoes gentle vacuum distillation, which removes alcohol while preserving its complex, crisp, and vibrant taste. The result is a sparkling wine with 0% ABV, safe for mothers-to-be and ready for enjoyed by all.

Celebrate your way with BEAU VIVA.