Pickled in Home Ec?
Is it just me or does everyone fear we might be getting a bit hysterical about teen drinking?
The headline this morning is about the scourge of alcohol abuse reaching plague proportion in teenagers. www.news.com.au/story/0,23599,23269606-36398,00.html
The “proof” behind the claim is a new survey which found one in five 16- and 17-year-olds now binge-drink – that is, drink to get drunk – in any given week.
The same survey found that one in eight children live at risk of exposure to an adult drinking at harmful levels.
Delve a little further and what does binge drinking actually mean to the people who conducted the survey? It means people that don’t drink much as a rule, but admit to more than four drinks for women on a Saturday night and more than six drinks for men. That’s how we define binge drinking! Having a few too many.
My children are most definitely at risk of exposure to that.
I believe with all my heart that we have to manage teenage drinking – but writing scaremongering articles doesn’t help!
I think the numbers of kids drinking these days is probably the same as it always was, (one in five 16-17 year olds actually sounds a bit low to me) the difference now is that parents let them do it on the street.
I don’t dispute that parents need to be reminded to keep their little darlings at home when they drink, but I don’t think we need articles drunk teenagers turning up to school – it’s just not happening!
The headline this morning is about the scourge of alcohol abuse reaching plague proportion in teenagers. www.news.com.au/story/0,23599,23269606-36398,00.html
The “proof” behind the claim is a new survey which found one in five 16- and 17-year-olds now binge-drink – that is, drink to get drunk – in any given week.
The same survey found that one in eight children live at risk of exposure to an adult drinking at harmful levels.
Delve a little further and what does binge drinking actually mean to the people who conducted the survey? It means people that don’t drink much as a rule, but admit to more than four drinks for women on a Saturday night and more than six drinks for men. That’s how we define binge drinking! Having a few too many.
My children are most definitely at risk of exposure to that.
I believe with all my heart that we have to manage teenage drinking – but writing scaremongering articles doesn’t help!
I think the numbers of kids drinking these days is probably the same as it always was, (one in five 16-17 year olds actually sounds a bit low to me) the difference now is that parents let them do it on the street.
I don’t dispute that parents need to be reminded to keep their little darlings at home when they drink, but I don’t think we need articles drunk teenagers turning up to school – it’s just not happening!
posted by Caroline Hutchinson at 9:57 AM
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