The Debate About Lowering the Drinking Age

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The battle over the drinking age has been going on for a long time now, and has recently been brought back into the forefront of people's minds with the Amethyst Initiative, a group of university and college presidents and chancellors who are debating lowering the drinking age. Mark Houston Recovery is against this idea, because enough people in America have a problem with alcohol addiction as it is - lowering the legal drinking age will only lead people to begin drinking earlier. Many teenagers and college students of course emphatically insist that the drinking age should be lowered from 21 to 18. They bring up a number of arguments to support this change: that they're mature enough to handle drinking, that if they can go fight for their country and vote that they should also be allowed to drink, that when at college, they're going to drink anyway, so why not make it legal, etc. Now, it's true that alcohol is widespread and easy to find on college campuses without being 21. It's also true that the age of 18 brings other great responsibilities like voting and fighting in a war. But are 18 year old teenagers really mature enough to handle being allowed to drink - and drink responsibly?

Not Drinking Until 21 is Safer

Let's take a minute and remember what it's like to be 18. Most people turn this age during their senior year of high school, when getting into college, finding a date for the prom, and hoping your high school friendships continue into college are your main concerns. Besides these things, at 18, you feel like your whole life is ahead of you, hormones run wild, and you're desperately trying to come to grips with being caught somewhere between childhood and adulthood. While maturity is something that varies for everyone, most 18 year olds aren't mature enough to handle drinking responsibly. And besides the maturity factor, there's also the safety issue. The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration reports that the 21 minimum drinking age law, enacted in 1984, has reduced traffic fatalities involving drivers 18 to 20 years old by 13% and saves approximately 900 lives a year. That's nearly 22,000 lives since the law was put into place. Those kind of numbers indicate that the current drinking age laws have had a significant effect on highway safety, which is something we can all benefit from.

Treating Alcoholism at Mark Houston Recovery

At Mark Houston Recovery, we have had many patients who struggle with alcohol addiction, both young and old. The general consensus is that regardless of whether you're 18 or 21 when you're able to legally start drinking, some people aren't able to control their drinking and develop an addiction to alcohol. No debates about lowering the drinking age will change the simple fact that alcohol addiction is a disease. The simple truth is that people who begin drinking earlier often have a higher chance at becoming an alcoholic later in life. The maturity issue aside, too much alcohol consumption will create a chemical dependency in your body. At Mark Houston Recovery, our goal is to help all our residents, especially out younger ones, understand the need to become sober to be able to live a long, healthy life free of alcohol addiction.