A new study has found that drinking as little as five goblets of wine a week in the first three months of pregnancy can significantly raise your risk of a premature birth even if you stop later.

The study's lead author, Colleen O'Leary, said: "Women should be advised that during pregnancy drinking alcohol above low levels increases the risk to the baby and that the safest choice is not to drink alcohol during pregnancy.

"Our research shows pregnant women who drink more than one to two standard drinks per occasion and more than six standard drinks per week increase their risk of having a premature baby, even if they give up drinking later."

In fact researchers at University of Western Australia have based their findings on an analysis of a random sample of 4,719 women giving birth in Western Australia between 1995 and 1997 who were sent questionnaires after their baby was born.

They found that women who drank more than one or two drinks a day during the first three months and then stopped drinking later in the pregnancy were more likely to deliver preterm than women who didn't drink at all or at low levels.

And, women who drank "heavily" in the first three months, defined as the equivalent of one bottle of wine over a week, or those who binged twice a week were twice as likely to deliver prematurely than those who drank at low levels, 'The Daily Telegraph' reported.

"The increasing tendency for young women in general to drink at risky levels including binge drinking should be recognised as an important modifiable cause of preterm birth and efforts need to be made to reverse this trend especially before women conceive," O'Leary said.