Where`s the Booze in the Drug War?
By Frosty Troy
[Frosty Troy is Editor of The Oklahoma Observer and is a frequent contributor to this journal.]
No sane person doubts that the war on drugs launched in the Reagan Administration has been lost, that $16 billion a year is wasted, that thousands of young lives have been tossed on the ash heap of the criminal justice system.
It doesn`t take a Carrie Nation mentality to see that what is socially acceptable is easily ignored. While parents and politicians rage against the evils of marijuana and the devastation of crack, pills, and heroin, the lives they claim are minimal compared to booze.
It is estimated that the annual cost to America of alcohol abuse tops $40 billion. The Surgeon General says the nation averages 100,000 deaths a year due to alcohol abuse.
More than half of the people entering America`s prisons are there because of problems related to alcohol and drugs.
If marijuana is the gateway to serious drug addiction, alcohol is the prime doorway to domestic violence and rampant crime.
National crime statistics show that alcohol is involved in:
35% of all rapes
61 % of all felony arrests
90% of all assaults
33% of all suicides
75% of all divorces
45% of all drownings
85% of all homicides
70% of all fatal falls
50% of all battered wives
65% of all child abuse cases
67% of all attempted suicides
90% of all college campus rapes
86% of all deaths related to fire
50% of all delinquency cases
40% of all industrial fatalities
55% of domestic arguments and assaults
There are an estimated 28.6 million children of alcoholics in the U.S., nearly seven million of them under age 18. Of the under-18 group, almost three million will develop alcoholism, other drug problems, and/or other serious coping problem.
About half of children of alcoholics marry alcoholics and are likely to recreate the same kinds of highly stressful and unhealthy families in which they grew up.
Children of alcoholics are at high risk for alcohol and other drug problems, often live with pervasive tension and stress, have higher levels of anxiety and depression, do poorly in school, and experience problems with coping.
During the time of the Vietnam War, alcohol in all its forms took four times more lives than the Vietnam War itself—250,000 vs. 56,000.
Every four minutes some driver will die as a result of drinking and driving. It`s the third leading cause of death in the United States. Four out of every five drivers will be in an alcohol-related accident.
Seven out of every 10 Americans can drink socially without becoming addicted, but one out of 10 drinkers will become alcoholics.
Alcohol is the number one cause of infant death (5,000 a year) and mental retardation, with fetal alcohol syndrome (36,000 a year).
It`s the number one killer of drivers and passengers under the age of 30.
More college students will die due to alcohol than will earn advanced degrees. Binge drinking is epidemic on many–some claim most–college campuses.
In spite of laws about underage drinking, 1.1 billion cans of beer are consumed by junior and senior high school students each year, according to a report by the Inspector General of the U. S. Department of Health and Human Services.
Alcohol-related highway deaths are the number one killer of 15 to 24 year-olds. Twenty-five percent of all hospital admissions are reported to be because of alcohol; more Medicare hospitalizations are credited to alcohol-related problems than to heart attacks.
From the moment of conception a fetus is susceptible to Fetal Alcohol Syndrome (FAS) if the mother is drinking, and that includes beer. A study published by the American Federation of Teachers stated that some 40,000 babies a year are born with FAS. Drug abuse of all kinds affected about 425,000 babies each year.
Courts, district attorney offices, juvenile affairs offices, litigation, all are impacted by alcohol and drug-related offenses.
More than a third of young mothers on welfare are addicted to alcohol, according to a report released by the Center on Addiction and Substance Abuse at Columbia University.
Alcohol in all its forms causes one-third of all preventable deaths in the United States.
Alcohol-related crashes claimed more than 16,600 lives last year and injured a million people. Drunk driving injuries and fatalities cost American society $46 billion annually in lost production, medical costs, property damages, and other direct expenditures.
A majority of occupants killed in drunk driving crashes did not wear seat belts.
Research shows that safety belts reduce the risk of fatal or serious injury to front seat passengers by 45 to 50 percent.
Congress passed and President Clinton signed a bill that penalizes states without a zero tolerance law for teens who drink and drive.
States could lose up to five percent of federal highway funds if the state does not pass a zero-tolerance law by this year, 1998.
How exorbitant must the price in dollars and human suffering be before grassroots Americans determine to reverse the trend in alcohol abuse? For years many groups have sought to pass laws, initiate programs, and educate the public to the dangers of alcohol and drug use, but America is losing the war.
