Vocal Voices

The annual Christmas report on alcohol abuse is out and the figures are staggering (excuse the pun).

Hospital visits for alcohol poisoning have doubled in six years and admissions due to the effects of alcohol, such as liver disease, have risen by more than 50% in nine years. The main rises are in the 15-44 age groups with females nearly 1.5 times more likely to be involved than males.

How have things got this bad? These young(er) people are ruining their future health, and in some cases killing themselves.

When I was in the younger end of the age group we would often go out and have one-too-many on a Friday or a Saturday night: rarely both. We would be "silly" drunk, but anyone found urinating in doorways, vomiting or unable to walk, was avoided like the plague. Nowadays those things seem like badges of honour.

I read a lot, from researchers and politicians, mentioning cost and availability of alcohol being the problems, but they cannot be the whole picture. Something else must be going on to drive the current trends.

I agree Frank, it is a real worry! A lot of those youngsters might well be dead before they get to late middle age

Most of us on VV are past the age of danger, but we either have children or grandchildren in, or approaching, the age ranges of concern.

We went through the period of limited alcohol outlets, closing times and relative cost, but those cannot be the only things that stopped us getting off our heads at any and every opportunity.

Nowadays it looks as though, for some people, getting 5h1t faced is the aim, and once that happens anything goes. Inhibitions drop, fights break out, sexual encounters become the norm, a night in the cells is to be celebrated (more booze please), a trip to A&E means nothing. These things appear to have taken hold in less than a decade.

I used to think that a return to off-licences, limited off-sales and limited opening hours, no advertising, would be the cure, but now I am wavering. There is a cultural change going on, and I do not know what it is or why.

Yes Frank, there certainly are retrograde cultural changes going on - and not only with regard to drinking.
(but I won't go into those now).

Young folk today have relatively more money to spend than we had, and alcoholic drink is now available at all hours.
I do sometimes think that drink-related hospital treatment should be paid for.

It is a big worry

When I was a teenager, there was a great big group of us always at the pub, but none of us ever went out with the intention of getting drunk
That's what I don't get, that that's somehow become the purpose of the evening
It can't just be the fact that we had less money

But, Aggers, it cannot be down to money, as Di and myself are saying.

Something else, as well as cost and availability, is at play here.

If I went out tonight in Faontaniblaeu, Tongeren, Den Bosch or Bonn I would not be assailed by drunks.

However, drinking, for some Europeans, is a leisurely thing, and for us Northern Europeans: Danes, Germans, Norwegians, Swedes, Brits it has become the thing to do.

It has never poisoned me ...er...YET

Exactly, Di! We would go out to have fun - sometimes we might get a bit drunk, but that wasn't the purpose of the evening. These days they 'pre-load' ie drink whilst getting ready to go out, and are already drunk or almost there when they go out! Some of the tales I heard from the girls I worked with in the shop really shocked me, and I'm no prude! A couple of them had even been in A&E getting pumped out, and seemed to think nothing of it

Becky drinks, but is not silly about it, and being a big girl it takes a lot to get her drunk, so she has never to my knowledge been completely 'out of it' I would hope she has the sense to keep herself safe...

Workingman wrote:But, Aggers, it cannot be down to money, as Di and myself are saying.

It does seem to be a northern European thing. In Italy getting blind drunk is not seen to be in any way cool. Drink is much cheaper in Cyprus, but you don't get the locals staggering around incapable every Saturday night.

Maybe because getting a hangover in a hot climate is even worse than in a cold climate?

To be honest when I was younger we would go out to nightclubs, have a few drinks in a pub first get a little merry but not rip roaring drunk as they do today. The accent was on having FUN and today I don't see how they can be if they are getting completely legless plus stoned with drugs etc. Drove through town centre last Saturday evening about 6.30ish and some where legless then.