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Don't Give Teens Alcohol -- Period!
By Barbara Cooke
The University of Minnesota's School of Public Health found that teens whose parents or friends' parents provided alcohol for parties were more likely to drink, get into traffic crashes, get involved in violence and participate in thefts. Robert Wood Johnson vice president Nancy Kaufman states, "Underage drinking is a factor in nearly half of all teen automobile crashes. It also contributes to suicides, homicides and fatal injuries, and is a factor in sexual assaults and date rapes." And Mothers Against Drunk Driving surveys estimate that when parents "bargain" with their kids and let them drink as long as they promise not to drive, teens are more likely to drive after drinking or be in a car with someone who is drinking.
Drinking can be fatal even without getting into a car with a driver who has been consuming alcohol. Atlanta-based National Family Partnership spokesperson Milton Creagh reminds parents that too many drinks ingested either accidently or intentionally can result in alcohol poisoning, which can result in death. "Alcohol is a drug that numbs the brain. If too much is used, it paralyzes the nerve center in the brain and puts the brain to sleep. When the brain slows down, so does the respiratory system," says Creagh. "When the lungs and heart stop sending oxygen to the brain, breathing stops. Are you going to monitor every teen at your party to make sure there's no binge drinking going on?"
A study done recently at The University of Michigan, reveals that 82 percent of 12th graders admitted drinking during the past year, and the Centers for Disease Control reports that 32 percent of high schoolers are binge-drinkers. Yet a poll conducted by the group Drug Strategies showed that only three percent of paents thought their teens had indulged in binge-drinking in the past month.
In 1997, a 16-year-old Orland Park, Ill. girl won an $80 bet by chugging a quart of 107-proof alcohol at a party. The Sandburg High School sophomore had been drinking with her best friend for six hours before they returned to her friend's house at 2 a.m. and fell asleep on the bed. They found her dead the next day. Her blood alcohol level was .381.
Smith urges parents to rethink just what "responsible drinking" is for someone under the age of 18. "Parents think they did it, so their kids can do it too. After all, parents don't want to say what they did as teens was all wrong."
