Analysis of Hospital Episodes Statistics (HES) data on the number of babies ‘diagnosed’ with Foetal Alcohol Syndrome (FAS) at birth shows that there are approximately 20 such babies diagnosed each year. This is not the number of babies actually born with FAS: it is widely recognised that many cases of FAS are only diagnosed later in childhood, and hence will not be identified through the national HES database, or may remain undiagnosed as children with learning or behavioural difficulty of unknown cause.