Teens who consume alcohol are more likely to engage in foolish, regrettable and dangerous behavior. Each of us pays a price when this occurs. Every community in Florida has a vested interest in reducing underage drinking.

Alcohol-attributable violent crime comprises the single-greatest cost to society, accounting for nearly one-half (48 percent) of the $3 billion figure. Other economic impacts detailed in the report include:

As always, parental involvement is the first line of defense — and the most effective tool in helping young people make wise decisions. Wise parents will heed the counsel of Robyn Vanover, coordinator of Martin County’s Safe and Drug Free Schools program.

“The No. 1 reason kids give as to why they don’t use drugs and alcohol is ‘my parents,’ ” Vanover said. “The main reason is always ‘my parents have an expectation of me.’ ”

A new MRI study finds that adolescents damage the white matter in their brain — which helps relay information between brain cells — when they binge on alcohol, HealthDay News reported April 21.

Researchers said that the study of 28 teens indicates that binge drinking could impair thinking and memory among teens, perhaps even affecting performance in school. Past studies have revealed white-matter damage in adult alcoholics. 

“It could be that episodes of binge drinking during the teenage years, when their brain is still developing, could have adversely influenced the brain’s white matter development,” said lead researcher Susan F. Tapert of the University of California at San Diego and director of Substance Abuse/Mental Illness at the VA San Diego Healthcare System.

Given the current rate of adolescent binge drinking in the U.S., Tapert said that one in four teens could be at risk of white-matter damage due to heavy alcohol use.

The report, Underage Alcohol Use: Findings from the 2002-2006 National Surveys on Drug Use and Health, states that more than 40 percent of youths ages 12 to 20 who used alcohol in the past 30 days reported receiving free alcohol from an adult. One in 16 underage drinkers, or an estimated 650,000 youths, had received alcohol from a parent or guardian in the past month.

“This report provides unprecedented insight into the social context of this public health problem and shows that it cuts across many different parts of our community,” said SAMHSA Administrator Terry Cline, Ph.D. “Its findings strongly indicate that parents and other adults can play an important role in helping influence — for better or for worse — young people’s behavior with regard to underage drinking.”

Preliminary animal research has shown that doses of alcohol similar to binge drinking episodes may cause cellular damage to the forebrain and hippocampus of adolescents, perhaps explaining why — as a different study of human subjects recently found  — people who begin drinking at a young age are at much higher risk of becoming alcoholics. Studies also have shown that young drinkers perform poorly on a variety of cognitive tests.

“There is no doubt about it now: there are long-term cognitive consequences to excessive drinking of alcohol in adolescence,” said Aaron White, assistant research professor in the psychiatry department at Duke University. “We definitely didn’t know 5 or 10 years ago that alcohol affected the teen brain differently. Now there’s a sense of urgency. It’s the same place we were in when everyone realized what a bad thing it was for pregnant women to drink alcohol.”

Youths who begin drinking alcohol early in life are significantly more likely to become dependent on alcohol later — many before they even reach the legal drinking age — according to a study of 43,000 U.S. adults. For example, 47 percent of those who began drinking before age 14 later become alcohol-dependent, compared to 9 percent of those who started drinking at age 21 or older.

The survey found that people who began drinking in their early teens were more likely to become dependent on alcohol at some point in their lives; in fact, about half met the criteria for alcohol dependence by the time they hit age 21. Young drinkers were found to be at elevated risk of dependence within 10 years of having their first drink, before age 25, and at any point in their lives. They also were more likely to experience multiple episodes of alcohol dependency.

The study was published in the July 2006 issue of the Archives of Pediatrics & Adolescent Medicine. 

For the study, researchers raised the blood-alcohol content of young male rats to between .05 and .09 percent through alcohol administration simulating low-dose binge drinking. They found that these rats exhibited higher tolerance for alcohol than a control group when exposed to alcohol again after several years of abstinence.

“Many people balance their alcohol consumption based on perceived changes in their behavior, and what we show is that you can have no changes in your behavior in terms of tolerance but still be changing liver and brain function that will produce tolerance later in life,” said lead researcher Douglas Matthews. “The body and brain are still developing during adolescence and this shows even a small amount of alcohol can have harmful effects.”

The study findings were published online Nov. 28, 2008 in the journal Alcohol.

A new MRI study finds that adolescents damage the white matter in their brain — which helps relay information between brain cells — when they binge on alcohol, HealthDay News reported April 21.

“It could be that episodes of binge drinking during the teenage years, when their brain is still developing, could have adversely influenced the brain’s white matter development,” said lead researcher Susan F. Tapert of the University of California at San Diego and director of Substance Abuse/Mental Illness at the VA San Diego Healthcare System.

Given the current rate of adolescent binge drinking in the U.S., Tapert said that one in four teens could be at risk of white-matter damage due to heavy alcohol use.

The report was published online in the journal Alcoholism: Clinical and Experimental Research.

PIERCE COUNTY, Wash. – Dozens of young people between the ages of 15 and 20 were arrested Saturday night for alcohol violations when police busted four underage drinking parties in the Sumner, Puyallup and Gig Harbor areas.

Eight adults were cited for furnishing alcohol to minors at the parties during the special “Spring Break patrol.”

Police say emergency aid was needed for an 18-year-old girl who attended a Key Peninsula party that drew 31 underage drinkers. The girl, with a preliminary blood alcohol level of .257, was taken to the hospital for potential alcohol poisoning.

“Deadly games designed to promote drinking large amounts of alcohol, such as beer bong, can lead to an overdose quickly,” said Busey.

In Puyallup, law enforcement officers obtained a search warrant to enter a rented home where four adults were discovered to have supplied alcohol to youth under the age of 21.