Preliminary study of how alcohol consumption during pregnancy affects immune components in breast milk and blood of postpartum women.

Human milk has been shown to contain numerous immune components that can potentially protect the infant during the period before its own immune system is completely developed. Alcohol consumption in both experimental animals and humans has been associated with alterations to a number of immune parameters. We have investigated the possibility that alcohol consumption during pregnancy alters certain immune components in day 3 postpartum breast milk and peripheral blood of women. Our study group consisted of 10 alcoholic beverage drinkers (moderate to heavy, most of whom smoked a 1/2-1 pack of cigarettes per day), 15 non-drinking/non-smoking controls, and 10 non-drinking/smokers (1/2-1 pack per day) controls. The immune parameters measured in these otherwise healthy women were: (1) percentage and absolute number of the various subsets of leukocytes; (2) percentage of T cells, B cells, T helper and cytotoxic/suppressors subsets, and natural killer cells; (3) levels of the cytokines IL-6, IL-8 and TNF-alpha; (4) levels of IgA in milk and IgG in serum. Milk from the alcohol group contained an elevated amount of IL-8 as compared with milk from non-smoker controls; however, it did not differ statistically from that of the smoker controls. Blood from the alcohol group showed an increased level of IL-8 when compared with that from both smoker and non-smoker controls. The total number of leukocytes in milk was elevated in milk from the alcohol group as compared to both the smoker and non-smoker control groups. In the leukocyte component of milk, neutrophils predominate and are responsible for the elevation in total number of cells, as both lymphocyte and macrophage populations did not differ from those of the controls. For lymphocytes, B cells were also increased in blood of the smokers as compared with the alcohol and non-smokers controls. There were no statistical differences in any of the other immune parameters tested among the three groups. The present study found that alcohol consumption during pregnancy could modulate the production of IL-8 and infiltration of certain leukocytes in milk and blood of postpartum women. Some of these alterations were also evident in the smoker controls and thus could not be attributed to alcohol consumption alone.