Photographer : rimesparse @ flickr
Barbie? Check.
Snags? Check.
Beers? Check.
All set then.
Australia is an alcohol-loving nation. Drink is linked to sporting success, celebrations such as birthdays, religious holidays, and work promotions. Most of us do it responsibly. But it seems over-indulgence is becoming ingrained in Australian society.
Many of us just don’t know when beers with mates become a binging problem. Scarily, young people are some of the biggest offenders. A recent study by the Australian National Council on Drugs found one in five 16 and 17-year-olds now binge drink at least once in any given week.
The presence of alcohol use among young people has also increased, with the average age of first use dropping to 14. Children as young as 12 are on the bottle, binge drinking at harmful levels.
‘But what I don’t get is what exactly is binge drinking?’ Hannah, 15 years
Have you ever drunk to get drunk? Or suffered a heinous hangover? Or vomited after a big night out? Or woken up on a Sunday morning and wondered how you made it home?
They’re all signs of binge drinking.
The Australian Alcohol Guidelines recommend guys over 18 drink no more than four standard drinks a day on average, with an occasional maximum of six. For girls over 18, it’s only two standard drinks a day, with a maximum of only four. Any more and that’s binge drinking.
‘I know I binge drink, but I don’t see what the problem is with it.’
Graham, 18 years
Three-thousand Australians die from alcohol-related illnesses each year.
In fact, the battle of the booze costs Australia more than $15.3 billion annually, wasting precious medical resources with more than 72,000 people admitted to hospital each year for excess drinking.
You see, the more you binge drink, the more you’re at risk of damaging your liver, heart and brain, developing sexual impotence or having psychological and emotional problems such as depression. And the prospects are even worse the younger you are. The American Medical Association says teenagers need only drink half as much as adults to suffer irreversible learning and memory impairment.
In the short-term, binge drinkers are more likely to engage in risk-taking behaviour such as unsafe or unwanted sex, illegal drug taking and drink driving.
And one of the biggest worries is the link between grog and street violence. The National Drug Research Institute recently undertook research on West Australian alcohol outlets’ sales figures. They found that every new bottle shop opened in a rural area will lead to 32 assaults, and each new city pub will cause 17 violent incidents each year.
The point? Binge drinking not only harms those who commit the crime, but also innocent bystanders.
‘Binge drinking just seems part of the Australian way of life.’
Sarah, 19 years
The one question that’s the hardest to answer is why. Why do people binge drink?
VicHealth senior researcher, Associate Professor John Fitzgerald, has a theory. ‘We tend to extract a greater amount of value from every hour of the day, more so than what we used to,’ he says. ‘There's a sense that when we do drink, we drink to get drunk, rather than drinking being part of our leisure time’.
So people binge drink because they are busy and trying to extract as much as they can from each moment. But as John Herron, the Australian National Council on Drugs chairman, points out, young people also binge drink because it has become normalised. ‘It’s often seen as a rite of passage into adulthood,’ he says. Basically, it’s ingrained in Aussie society.
And this is what makes the binge drinking culture so hard to break.
‘I don’t know how they’re going to stop it.’
Hannah, 15 years
OK, so the diagnosis is obvious—binge drinking is at epidemic levels. The problem now is finding the right cure.
At the moment the nation’s drug and alcohol treatment providers don’t have enough resources to deal with the binge drinking dilemma.
Hopefully a new $53 million plan by the federal government will help tackle the problem. The plan includes a shock advertising campaign, like those for anti-smoking, and an education program for young Australians. Nearly $15 million will also be used to help sporting clubs develop drinking codes of conduct, given the strong correlation between binge drinking and sport.
Some organisations and government bodies, such as VicHealth and the Australian Drug Foundation, think more can be done. They’re calling on the alcohol industry and parents to take responsibility. They want less liquor licences assigned and parents to be penalised for supplying alcohol at underage parties.
But will this beat the battle of the booze?
It’s going to take years to break Australia’s culture of binge drinking. But that doesn’t mean we should give up before we start. Right now what’s important is that we all start to take responsibility for our own actions and do what’s right for our own health.
Affected by binge drinking yourself or know someone who is? Check out our sister site http://www.reachout.com.au and their fact sheet on binge drinking.
How do I know this?
ABC Online, 2008, ‘Binge drinking initiative a good first step’, March 10,
www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2008/03/10/2185610.htm?section=justin
Australian Drug Foundation,
www.adf.org.au
Australian National Council on Drugs,
www.ancd.org.au
Bantick, C, 2008, ‘Ship of Beers on a deadly voyage’, The Sunday Mail (Brisbane), March 9.
Duncan P, 2008, ‘Youth binge drink alarm’, Hobart Mercury, February 25,
www.news.com.au/mercury/story/0,22884,23270359-5007221,00.html
Haywood B & Martin L, 2008, ‘The battle of the bottle’, March 17,
www.theage.com.au/news/education-news/the-battle-of-the-bottle/2008/03/14/1205472087298.html
Lunn, S, 2008, ‘Teenage drink and drug abuse rife’, The Australian, February 25,
www.theaustralian.news.com.au/story/0,,23269564-2702,00.html?from=public_rss
Moodie R, 2007, ‘Butts out but boozing is up’, VicHealth,
www.vichealth.vic.gov.au/Content.aspx?topicID=418
Ninemsn Health, 2008, Binge drinking,
www.health.ninemsn.com.au/article.aspx?id=18718
Reach Out, 2008, Binge drinking,
www.reachout.com.au/default.asp?ti=2113
