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underage drinking
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Underage drinking is a serious even deadly problem. Alcohol use is a contributing factor to the four leading causes of death for young people: Accidents. Vehicle deaths. Homicides. And suicides. Nearly 40,000 young people ages 15 to 24 die from one of these four causes each and every year. That’s like wiping the populations of Conroe or San Marcos off the map – every year. With every person who died never having the chance to reach their full potential. The trouble is, even the most well-meaning people of all – parents – don’t have the facts about underage drinking. Nor do they understand how the environment kids live in can encourage such drinking. Most folks work hard to be good parents. We put our children in car safety seats. We insist on bike helmets. We cover electrical sockets and keep dangerous chemicals out of reach. But one dangerous chemical – alcohol – is harming and even killing our children. And still, parents don’t recognize the scope of the problem – or its roots. Parents seriously underestimate the amount and severity of underage drinking. Most parents guess that young people take their first drink by age 16 or 17 . What parents once considered a high school rite of passage is now daily life at middle school. And it’s incredibly dangerous. children can develop alcohol dependency in as little as six months. And a growing body of evidence suggests that even modest alcohol consumption in late childhood and adolescence results in brain damage – possibly permanent brain damage. Did you know that, the part of the brain responsible for learning and memory – was 10 percent smaller than in teens who abused alcohol than it is in teens who did not abuse alcohol. Adolescents who abuse alcohol may remember 10 percent less of what they initially learn – when compared to non-drinking adolescents. Despite the dangers, parents consistently underestimate the amount their own children and friends drink . according to what the kids told me is that most parents don’t believe their children drink. After all – they are good parents, aren’t they? When parents speak to their children about the dangers of alcohol. They figured that was enough. It doesn’t help that industry advertising implies that talking to teens about alcohol is the rough equivalent of a measles shot: Give them a quick jab that hurts for a minute – and they’ll be fine. Only advertising could make it sound so easy and be so false. Unfortunately, many parents have bought the message, hook, line and sinker. they tended to place responsibility for underage drinking on themselves and other parents. After decades of listening to industry “responsibility” ads, they often blame underage drinking on “bad parenting.” In truth, a sizable number of children and adolescents who drink – are living in the homes of very good parents. You see, even when parents talk to their children repeatedly about alcohol , and many parents do, the fact is this: children are living in an environment where alcohol is everywhere; where alcohol advertisements and products are designed to appeal to an ever-younger audience; and where alcohol is cheap and accessible.
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