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April 10, 2002
The College Drinking Numbers Game
Dozens of leading U.S. newspapers are screaming the findings of the latest study from Ralph Hingson of the Boston University School of Public Health, who now claims that alcohol is a contributing factor in 1,400 deaths and over a half-million cases of physical assault at American universities every year. Hingson also sits on MADD's board of directors, is MADD's vice president of public policy, has published nearly 50 manuscripts on the dangers of alcohol, and has a history of anti-alcohol activism. Coincidence?
Hingson says a population equal to "the entire city of Boston" are beaten up each year at colleges, and Hingson's co-chair on the project, the University of South Florida's Mark Goldman, says "half the World Trade Center casualties are happening every year in our colleges," all because of alcohol. But as the Associated Press reports, "the statistics included college students killed in car accidents if the students had alcohol in their blood, even if the level was below the legal limit."
And many of the stories linked the Hingson report with a study released last month by Harvard researcher Henry Wechsler that said 44 percent of college students "binge drink" -- defined as "five or more drinks on one occasion for a man or four or more drinks on one occasion for a woman." But "one occasion" is not defined -- it could be an hour, it could be a day. And neither is "drink."
By the Hingson standard, a student involved in a fender-bender on a Sunday morning driving home from church after a communion sip of wine has been in an "alcohol-related" accident. And by Weschler's logic, a 135-pound female college senior who has four beers at a friend's six-hour-long graduation party is a "binge drinker" -- even though her blood alcohol content would be just .03% at the end of the party.
Still, Hingson says he believes his "projections are conservative," and that alcohol is an even greater problem than his trumped-up numbers show. And his report, funded by the National Institute of Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism, demands change. It's even called "A Call to Action: Changing the Culture of Drinking at U.S. Colleges."
Goldman says simply educating students about alcohol does not work without trying to change a campus culture that encourages heavy drinking, The Washington Post reports. That change will come by restricting alcohol access and increasing the use of roadblocks.
A recent RAND Corporation report promotes a "blame the producers and distributors" model for controlling alcohol use. Author Deborah Cohen writes: "Alcohol consumption by any individual is, in part, a function of the overall distribution of consumption of the community and leads to the conclusion that [the] magnitude of alcohol-related health problems in a population is directly related to per capita consumption. Individual consumption in turn is associated with various factors affecting the physical and social availability of the product within the community in which individuals reside."
Translation: Though there may be only a few real abusers, reducing the availability and consumption of alcohol among all adults, no matter how moderate and responsible, is necessary. Among her recommendations, "greater restrictions on alcohol accessibility, stricter disciplinary measures for violations" and "laws restricting where it is acceptable to drink."
Dozens of leading U.S. newspapers are screaming the findings of the latest study from Ralph Hingson of the Boston University School of Public Health, who now claims that alcohol is a contributing factor in 1,400 deaths and over a half-million cases of physical assault at American universities every year. Hingson also sits on MADD's board of directors, is MADD's vice president of public policy, has published nearly 50 manuscripts on the dangers of alcohol, and has a history of anti-alcohol activism. Coincidence?
Hingson says a population equal to "the entire city of Boston" are beaten up each year at colleges, and Hingson's co-chair on the project, the University of South Florida's Mark Goldman, says "half the World Trade Center casualties are happening every year in our colleges," all because of alcohol. But as the Associated Press reports, "the statistics included college students killed in car accidents if the students had alcohol in their blood, even if the level was below the legal limit."
And many of the stories linked the Hingson report with a study released last month by Harvard researcher Henry Wechsler that said 44 percent of college students "binge drink" -- defined as "five or more drinks on one occasion for a man or four or more drinks on one occasion for a woman." But "one occasion" is not defined -- it could be an hour, it could be a day. And neither is "drink."
By the Hingson standard, a student involved in a fender-bender on a Sunday morning driving home from church after a communion sip of wine has been in an "alcohol-related" accident. And by Weschler's logic, a 135-pound female college senior who has four beers at a friend's six-hour-long graduation party is a "binge drinker" -- even though her blood alcohol content would be just .03% at the end of the party.
Still, Hingson says he believes his "projections are conservative," and that alcohol is an even greater problem than his trumped-up numbers show. And his report, funded by the National Institute of Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism, demands change. It's even called "A Call to Action: Changing the Culture of Drinking at U.S. Colleges."
Goldman says simply educating students about alcohol does not work without trying to change a campus culture that encourages heavy drinking, The Washington Post reports. That change will come by restricting alcohol access and increasing the use of roadblocks.
A recent RAND Corporation report promotes a "blame the producers and distributors" model for controlling alcohol use. Author Deborah Cohen writes: "Alcohol consumption by any individual is, in part, a function of the overall distribution of consumption of the community and leads to the conclusion that [the] magnitude of alcohol-related health problems in a population is directly related to per capita consumption. Individual consumption in turn is associated with various factors affecting the physical and social availability of the product within the community in which individuals reside."
Translation: Though there may be only a few real abusers, reducing the availability and consumption of alcohol among all adults, no matter how moderate and responsible, is necessary. Among her recommendations, "greater restrictions on alcohol accessibility, stricter disciplinary measures for violations" and "laws restricting where it is acceptable to drink."
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