Alcohol Consumption

Many students consider drinking an integral part of the social life because it promotes joy, it reduces tensions and inhibitions and in generally it loosens the atmosphere. With all these, the social consumption of alcohol can lead to problems, such as lost school hours, weak performances at the exams, fights and accidents. Certainly, the most severe problem is represented by car accidents, which are considered to be the primarily cause of deaths for the persons aged between 15 and 24. When the legal age for drinking has been diminished from 21 to 18, the percentage of road accidents for the 18-19-segment has increased from 20% to 50%.

Approximately two-thirds of the American adults declare to drink alcohol. At least 10% of them have social, psychological and medical problems associated with drinking alcohol. Possibly half of the 10% mentioned above have developed an addiction. Intense and prolonged drinking can lead to serious health problems such as high sanguine pressure, vascular cerebral stroke, mouth, throat and stomach cancer, liver affections, and depression.

Furthermore, alcohol can lead to severe problems of fetal development. Pregnant women who drink a lot are twice as more exposed to spontaneous abortions and also to preterm births. The disease called the syndrome of fetal alcoholism has the following characteristics: mental retard and multiple deformities of the child's face and mouth. The quantity of alcohol needed in order to produce this syndrome is unclear, but only a few grams of alcohol per week are considered to be noxious.

Also, there are cultural differences concerning the disorders connected to alcohol drinking. The low rates of consumption in Taiwan and China can be partially explicated by the absence, in approximately 50% of the Asian population, of an enzyme which eliminates the first decomposition product of the alcohol, acetaldehyde. When these persons are drinking, their faces turn red and they also have palpitations. The created discomfort determines these individuals not to drink.

The low rate of diseases connected to the alcohol consumption in Asia can also be attributed to the Confucianism, which though the moral ethics discourage the exaggerated drinking. They also consider alcohol to be adequate for festive occasions but not for personal pleasure. Although the United States does not have the highest rate of alcohol addiction in the world, alcohol abuse and alcohol addiction are the most frequent disorders in the USA, with approximately 24% of the population presenting addiction symptoms.

There are also substantial differences between ethnic groups in the United States. One of these groups presenting a high risk is the Native American's group. Hospital registers show that diseases associated with alcohol consumption are twice more frequent for the Native Americans compared to the other ethnic groups. This high rate is linked to the excessive rates of poverty and unemployment, to the weaker educational system and to a more intense feeling of desperation and helplessness.

Other differences encountered in this field are connected to sex and age. Studies show that men are more predisposed than women to alcoholism in all cultures, but the level of this predisposition varies from a culture to another. The differences between sexes are more increased in the cultures that subscribe the traditional sex roles. This means that men who develop a behavior which involves alcohol are approved, but the same behavior manifested by women is not consented, nor approved. Concerning age differences, elder persons are less inclined to consume alcohol than younger ones. This fact can have several causes. Firstly, there can be health problems because their liver is affected by age and alcohol can lead to severe health problems; secondly, elder persons are supposed to take more mature decisions and thirdly, these persons have been brought up in times when alcohol abuse was prohibited and it was also stigmatized.

In conclusion, alcohol is an undeniable reality in these days. People are led by stressful events and by their anxieties to alcohol abuse and also to alcohol addiction. The way people relate to alcohol is different from a culture to another, from men to women, from a way of thinking to another. Alcohol abuse and alcohol addiction can destruct one's health, social life and economic well-being.