Why did doctors prescribe Guinness to pregnant women?

Back in the day when real men smoked and doctors wore white coats, prescribing beer to pregnant women was an acceptable thing to do. They don’t do that sort of thing anymore. But for many people, the question of the nutritional merits of Guinness remains unanswered. I mean, those doctors must have known something, right?

The usual reason you hear for Guinness being suggested in pregnancy is that it’s a great source of iron. Iron is needed for the production of red blood cells and during pregnancy a mother-to-be needs 50% more than iron than usual (27mg per day compared to 18mg). It is of upmost importance for her and her unborn child that she gets enough iron as not enough can cause anaemia in her and (if prolonged) a smaller baby. So if Guinness does contain iron, then drinking it (almost) sounds like a good idea.

The iron content of Guinness — officially

To find out more, we sent an email to Guinness to ask them about the nutritional content (specifically iron) of their ancient Irish beverage. They replied:

Oh well, maybe they don’t know. Let’s see if we can help them out…

Guinness has even less iron than you think

Many websites list the iron content of a pint of Guinness as being 0.3mg (which is not very much). We’ve been unable to find the original source of this number — for all we know, someone could have just made it up. Stout beer…