The Dangers Of Underage Drinking
The use of alcohol by minors is at an all-time high in the united states, with it being the most gone to drug for ages 15*19. Not only is it bad and dangerous for developing younger minds, it's also against the law. Now the numbers of high schoolers are also followed by the high number of middle school kid's now drinking and smoking marijuana. 10% of gth graders drank some amount ofalcohol in the last 30 days. The risk for teenagers drinking isn't just a health and mental concern,teens who start drinking at age 15 years are 5 times morelikely to develop alcohol dependence or abuse it later on in life. Not only does underage drinking lead to higher risk of young teens wanting to harm themselves or others,but alcohol also leads to bad decisions like drinking and driving,or doingthings you wouldn't normally do. Teens young bodies may not be as used to the effect alcohol has on it, being more susceptible to make mistakes. In this essay were going to go through the effects and dangers alcohol can have on the young body, but also examples of bad decisions that are more likely to be led on by alcohol related behaviors.
From personal experiences to statistics about the dangers, Ihope that in the end this essay helps educate a young reader thinking about trying alcohol before their legally allowed to. The law isn't there to be mean and not let you have fun,its set in place for a reason to keep you and others safe. If this can help you make the simpledecision to not drink,then were one step closer to making teens all across the country be safer and make smarter choices for their bodies and health,and for other people's safety as well. Underage drivers are more susceptible than adults to the alcohol-induced impairment of driving skills. The national highway traffic safety administration estimates that the 21year old drinking age law have reduced alcohol traffic fatalities by 13 percent and have saved around 29,000 lives since 1975. Sadly, still around 1500 people under 21die every year due to underage drinking and driving. The majority of underage alcohol related deaths are not traffic related, instead they are usually due to fatal accidents including homicide,suicides, alcohol poisoning, burns, falls, drownings, etc. Proving that alcohol impairsyour state of mind and the way you act, hindering your decisions. In 2011 around 180,000 teens under the age of 21,visited the hospital due to alcohol related incidents.
This represents 43 percent of all underage emergency visits due to drugs uses. People mostly highlight the dangers of teen drinking linked to driving and accidents,but the even higher majority of injuries aren't do to a car crash at all. Teens tend to make poor decisions when under the influence of alcohol or drugs. You have some alcohol in your system,you get bold and feel like you're on top of the world,your friends dare you to do something stupid and before you know it you could be in the hospital with a broken leg forjumpi ng off the stairs into a crowd at a party. I've seen it plenty of times, people wanting to show off because their confidence it out the roof,and end up hurting themselves or others really badly. Sadly,we still loose teens and young adults every year due to alcohol related accidents and injuries. Whenwill we learn? Is it just human nature to do what you feel because you want to, and ignore the negative signs that try and prevent you,or do we teens just really not know how dangerous it is until we have to learn a tough lesson or maybe even be close to death from it? It makes you question,do we really do all we can to prevent teens from getting a hold of alcohol and to protect their growing minds? Many people think this could never happen to them,especially young adults and teens. Surely you would know if you drank too much and you were dying, wouldn't you? Alcohol poisoning is almost like a silent killer.
Once you consume alcohol it filters through your liver and almost immediately goes into yourblood stream. Every little detailof what you did ahead of time that day determines the effects alcohol has on your body. Did you eat that day,take any medications, are you sad or depressed,had you recently lost or gained weight. Alcohol effects everyone differently, and can affect you differently each time. You may think you know your body and how much is your limit, but its constantly changingjust like your body does. Symptoms of alcohol poisoning a person might experience or show are very similar to just normal intoxicated actions of a person. The person may become extremely confused,disoriented, slurred speech,blurry vision,but unexperienced young drinkers or even adults, may not know that they are or someone there with is on the verge of alcohol poisoning. Telltale signs are shallow breathing, decreased heart rate,and the individual may even pass out or go into a coma. Let's say you're at a small party with your friends, everyone's drinking and having a goodtime. Your friend Johnny gets really drunk then around 30 minutes after, you see him asleep on the couch. You all just think he's drank too much and went to sleep,when in reality his body couldn't filter all the alcohol he drank fast enough,and as he's passed out it's still going into his bloodstream. No one checks on him because you all assume he's sleeping off his drunk,but really his breathing is shallow and his temperature is spiking,Johnny is slowly dying of alcohol poising with no obvious symptoms.
Teens not only don't know how to drink properly,they abuse it. Teens and young adults don't typically have a class of wine to relax after a long week,they like to party and drink to get drunk. All ages fall victimto alcohol poising, but teens are typically the more targeted victims. Teens usually consume 90 percent of their alcohol by binge drinking. Too much too fast, can lead you down a fatal road, It happens way too often and some teens make it out okay with help from the hospital,but there's still that sad percentage of teens who sadly die from alcohol poising. Drunk teenagers and no supervision is highly dangerous. Kids and teens make unsmart decisionssober, when you mix being intoxicated into the equation,an endless amount of dangers are present. Mild Cognitive Impairment (MCI) causes a slight but noticeable and measurable decline in cognitive abilities. Alcohol heavily impairs your ability to properly process thoughts and actions. Usually, leading an intoxicated person to make poor decisions,not fully thinking them through. You hear stories about stupid crazy things people have done while drunk. For example,there was a recent story released by dailymail. com about two 19 year old girls suing a bar because of a video taken of them in the establishment was leaked to sexual websites. The two girls were served 5 cocktails in 90 minutes and towards the end of their night were taking their clothes off and dancing in the middle of the dance floor. They even said they initially went there to drink because they knew they could be served.
Their blaming the bar for getting them drunk and claiming they used them as "sex slaves" for the night. We all make mistakes, and we usually make even more while intoxicated. While alcohol impairs your decisions, and you may not fully know what you're doing, at the end of the dayit was your decision to drink and drink to the point where you don't fully understand what you're doing. That's another reason underage drinking is bad and dangerous. You could potentially put yourself in situations you would normally never be in. Being intoxicated may lead you to make decisions without thinkingthem through ATALL beforehand. What happened to those girls is very embarrassi ng and humiliating,while no one stopped them from doing what they did no one forced them,they were willing participants. You can't try and correct your decisions by saying "oh,Iwas drunk that wasn't really me. " Your actions stay in the past forever and now a days social media makes things hard to leave in the past because their on the internet forever.
