Underage alcohol consumption
ISSUE SUMMARY
Alcohol is the most widely used substance of abuse among America’s youth. A higher percentage of young people between the ages of 12 and 20 use alcohol than use tobacco or illicit drugs. The physical consequences of underage alcohol use range from health problems to death by alcohol poisoning, and alcohol plays a significant role in risky sexual behavior, physical and sexual assaults, various types of injuries, and suicide. Underage drinking also creates secondhand effects for others, drinkers and nondrinkers alike, including car crashes from drunk driving. Underage drinking is a factor in nearly half of all teen automobile crashes, which is the leading cause of death among teenagers, and linked to two-thirds of all sexual assaults and date rapes. Underage alcohol consumption is a major societal problem with enormous health and safety consequences.
Research shows that the adolescent brain may be particularly susceptible to long term negative consequences from alcohol use. The brain goes through dynamic change during adolescence, and alcohol can seriously damage long- and short-term growth and cognitive, intellectual and social development processes. Emerging research also makes it clear that an adolescent’s decision to use alcohol is influenced by multiple factors. These factors include normal maturational changes that all adolescents experience: genetic, psychological, and social factors specific to each adolescent; and the various social and cultural environments that surround adolescents, including their families, schools, and communities.
The process of solving the public health problem of underage alcohol use begins with an examination of our own attitudes toward underage drinking, and our recognition of the seriousness of its consequences for adolescents, their families, and society as a whole. Adolescent alcohol use is not an acceptable rite of passage, but a serious threat to adolescent development and health, as the statistics related to adolescent impairment, injury, and death attest.
ADOPTED POLICY
That the Kansas Medical Society continue to actively oppose underage drinking by working toward a comprehensive, community-based, environmental approach that includes local and state policies and medical services. KMS believes that underage alcohol use is not inevitable, and schools, parents, caregivers, and other adults are not powerless to stop it. Alcohol use needs to be addressed early, continuously, and in the context of human development using a systematic approach that spans childhood through adolescence into adulthood. KMS will continue to support sensible public health/environmental policies designed to avoid or curtail underage alcohol consumption.
Adopted by the KMS House of Delegates on May 1, 2010.
