(Transcript from World News Australia Radio)
When it comes to the dangers of drinking alcohol while pregnant, the message may not be getting through.
Australian researchers say only two out of three women know that alcohol can affect their unborn child.
Western Australia's young person of the year Lewis Abdullah knows this well.
The 19 year old has foetal alcohol syndrome.
He's determined to stop others ending up like him.
Ryan Emery reports.
At a gym in Perth's southern suburbs, 19 year old Lewis Abdullah and two other Aboriginal dancers are performing for school children.
What some of them may suspect, but the majority wouldn't know, is that Lewis's mother is an alcoholic.
The alcohol she drank while pregnant with Lewis affected his body and brain - the physical effects are clear to see.
Yet, it hasn't stopped the youth mentor becoming Western Australia's Young Person of the Year.
Now he's sharing his story of his alcoholic mother and father, hoping to stop a new generation from suffering the same fate.
"Well, I'm here to talk to you about my life experience, what I've achieved and where I want to be. My life experiences are when I was young, as a little baby, my mother she was alcoholic, so was my father. They couldn't do the role as parents, so I was put in the care of my nanna - who's in the audience."
Lewis's family says he delivers a powerful message to a younger generation.
His aunt, Michelle Kickett, says they didn't think Lewis would do something like mentoring, but in hindsight he was always a "talker and a bit of a charmer".
"A lot of kids know Lewis in the community, I feel that they all look up to him. So a slow progress, I think, in that they all know, they know themselves what he promotes to them about drinking and peer pressure and stuff. They all understand that because it's coming from Lewis and not from myself or anyone older, and someone that still hangs around with the younger generation."
Although Lewis was taken in by his grandmother, he can't escape the pain alcohol abuse causes.
His father died last year.
"It's been a rough trek, I could say that. Especially losing my father at the age of 18 just last year, so it was a very sad day. You might as well say, he died from alcohol and cigarettes. Smoked all his life, drank all his life. There was never a day for him to be sober, really."
For the last three years, Lewis has been at HALO - a youth mentor organisation that tries to keep Aboriginal youths on the straight and narrow.
He mentors at the HALO centre in the Perth suburb of Spearwood, but also visits juveniles in detention to speak with them about the direction their lives are taking.
Now the 19 year old hopes to spread his influence to a larger audience.
"You need to get the word out there. There's enough out there, but people are still doing stuff all. Still see kids going to parties; you see pregnant women drinking away and it's like oh, so I reckon that you need to get the word out there properly and drum it through people's head to say: if you're pregnant, don't drink. If you're underage, well, the parents need to step up and control their children."
Doctor James Fitzpatrick, a former Young Australian of the Year, believes Lewis can make a difference and wants to take him on a tour of remote communities.
The researcher from the Telethon Institute for Child Health Research has been wanting to meet Lewis since he won the award.
Over a cup of tea in the HALO kitchen, they talk about the 19 year old's plans.
"Your story is incredibly powerful. Your message and your example is a real inspiration to other people and also you can talk about the challenges that you have faced in life, but not just how you've overcome them for yourself, but how you help other people to make a really good go of it. So I just think that you're really an inspiration to a lot people and the people that work at my work place, the Telethon Institute, who do a lot of work around alcohol and pregnancy and FASD, they all love you. They all know your story, they're all really proud of you. I think they'd like to work with you."
The FASD Dr Fitzpatrick is referring to is Foetal Alcohol Spectrum Disorder.
Alcohol is toxic to a developing baby, and can result in a spectrum of problems such as altered facial features, poor memory and planning, difficulty regulating emotions, and using language.
Someone with FASD can have some of the symptoms and not the others.
In Lewis's case, his mother drank so much he has all the symptoms.
Doctor Fitzpatrick says there needs to be better education around the issue.
"So around prevention we need to do better. Around diagnosis we need to do better. Many health professionals do not ask about alcohol during pregnancy and many health professionals do not know the features of alcohol foetal syndrome or the full spectrum. So we need to, as a body of health professionals, become a lot better at looking out for and asking about alcohol use and then diagnosing FASD.
Doctor Fitzpatrick says it isn't known how many people suffer from FASD in Australia.
But he suspects the numbers are high, with many sufferers ending up in the justice system.
"But if we don't understand their unique and special needs, we can treat them in the classroom or in the home environment as though they have no challenges and that's when they do really badly. So being aware of alcohol foetal spectrum disorders, knowing how to assess for it and look at people's particular strengths, but also their challenges is very important in putting together effective management strategies at home and in the school environment.
As for the level of frequency of FASD in Australia, there may be an answer soon.
A first-of-its-kind Australian study into the prevalence of FASD is underway in WA's Fitzroy Valley, with the findings expected in the coming months.
