Underage Drinking: Access and Consequences

Underage Drinking: Access and Consequences

Underage drinking is a serious problem in the United States. Young people have more of a chance of dying from alcohol related causes than from drugs. People who drink under the legal drinking age of twenty-one, put themselves at risk for health problems and have a tendency for risky behavior. According to James Henslin, studies show that two-thirds of all high school students drink alcohol during their senior year and almost half of them have done so with the past month. Data from the 2005 Monitoring the Future (MTF) study showed that in an annual survey of United States youth, three-fourths of twelfth graders, more than two-thirds of tenth graders, and about two in every eighth graders have consumed alcohol (National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism).

Where young people obtain alcohol is a bigger problem than most people realize. They obtain alcohol through a variety of sources. The most common sources are at parties, from friends, or from adults who purchase the alcohol for them.

One way young people, who are under the age of twenty-one, buy alcohol is through commercial sources. Commercial sources include two different types of establishments, off-license and on-license. Off-license establishments include liquor stores, markets, convenient stores, etc., where they sell the alcohol for people to consume in other places. People under twenty-one buy alcohol from these places, knowing most people working at these places do not really care whether they are twenty-one or not, even though these sales are illegal. Purchase surveys in the United States show that anywhere from forty percent to ninety percent of outlets sell to underage buyers, depending on location (National Research Council). On-license establishments include bars, restaurants, theaters, etc., where people buy and consume the alcohol at the establishment. I think in certain places this is where you will find a lot of underage drinking. The owners of these establishments fail to check IDs because they just want to make money. If that is not the case, the underage people use Fake IDs, or they have adults buy them the alcohol.

Most often young drinkers obtain alcohol through social sources, such as friends' acquaintances, family members or adult purchasers. It is essential to communicate strong norms about the unacceptability of adults providing alcohol to minors or facilitating alcohol use by minors (National Research Council). Using the media is one way to increase awareness of all the laws against adults providing alcohol to minors. This can help to reduce the social access or to enforce the social sources to stop providing the alcohol.

Parties are one of the major ways minors gain access to alcohol. In one study, thirty-two percent of sixth graders, fifty-six percent of ninth graders, and sixty percent of twelfth graders, reported obtaining alcohol at parties (National Research Council). Parties are usually held at in a home, an outdoors area or a hotel room and involve large groups of underage drinkers. In most cases these parties are funded, both with money and with alcohol, by people who are old enough to by the alcohol or even by the parents of one of the underage drinkers. Parents seem to think if they are in a certain area, like in a home, where they think nothing can happen to them it is alright for minors to drink. The public and law enforcement think differently and are cracking down on these parents, who are getting into serious trouble. Although police officers cannot always tell whom the underage drinkers are by sight or know who the person is who provided the alcohol, law enforcements awareness of these situations can help to dissuade and express the wrongness and unacceptability to adults of what they are doing.

False identification, or fake IDs, is another way minors can get alcohol; by purchasing it themselves. False identifications can be easily obtained in the United States through magazines, the Internet, from friends who make them or who know other people who make them or can get them somehow. The use of false identification may increase as it becomes more easily available through the Internet (National Research Council). Electronic scanning is a new way to check the validity of drivers license IDs when purchasing alcohol. However, it is not a requirement by law to use one and the cost and inconvenience to retailers causes resistance.

["Ultimately, adults are responsible for young people obtaining alcohol

by selling, providing, or otherwise making it available to them. Given

the fact that young people use multiple sources for alcohol, efforts should

not focus exclusively on commercial access to alcohol, but should also

address social availability through parents, friends and strangers (National Research Council)."]

When young people drink it impairs their decision-making and can result in illness, injury and death. When studied, youths who start drinking before age fifteen compared to those who waited until they were twenty-one had very different results. The youths were twelve times more likely to be unintentionally injured while under the influence of alcohol, seven times more likely to be in a motor vehicle crash after drinking and ten times more likely to have been in a physical fight after drinking (National Research Council).

Drinking and driving is one of the most common risk taking behaviors done by young people. There have been laws made which have lowered the blood alcohol levels for underage drivers to 0.02, compared to the normal limit of 0.08 to 0.10. Youths who have been drinking are more likely to be in a serious car accident that can result in serious injuries or death. They also tend to make bad decisions, such as not wearing their seat belts and getting into cars with intoxicated drivers, who are usually underage too.

Minors who drink take a lot of risks that can have very dangerous and sometimes fatal consequences that not always involve motor vehicles. Nearly forty percent of people under age twenty-one who were victims of drowning, burns and falls tested positive for alcohol (National Research Council). Drinking has also been involved in deaths and injuries that were from violence and suicidal behavior. People who drink heavily have increased feelings of worthlessness, thoughts of suicide, and suicide attempts.

["Alcohol has been reported to be involved in thirty-six percent of

homicides, twelve percent of male suicides and eight percent of female

suicides