Alcoholism in New Zealand

Alcoholism in New Zealand – Why it is serious problem in New Zealand

It is fact that alcohol can be damage people for many ways. Paula (2007) lists some of serious effects from alcohol which it can affect to body, brain and mental health.  It might be affect to wide range of people in society even can be social problem as well as in New Zealand. In other words, Alcoholism is one of the most significant negative aspects in New Zealand society. The numbers of accidents caused by drinking are increases year by year. For example, violent crime is one of the most significant injuries caused by alcoholism. According to the survey of ANZPAA (2009), at least 33% of offensive, violent crimes were caused by alcohol in 2007 to 2008. Furthermore, alcoholism caused to increasing of death rate in recent years.  NZPA (2010) says the number of deaths related to alcohol is rapidly raised from 41 to 254 in 8 years.  They also reported a schoolboy died from the over drunk which relates to one of the serious aspects of alcoholism, young aged drunker. It is clear that alcoholism is serious problems in New Zealand so there are some organizations to cope with this problem. The Alcohol Advisory Council of New Zealand (ALAC) is one of the big groups to struggle with the alcoholism in New Zealand which has more than 30 years history and corporate with this problem for many ways.  Furthermore, government tries to solve with this problem as well as John (2010) reported in this article. To sum up, alcoholism is the serious society problems in New Zealand even a number of people try to cope with that.

 

Young Alcoholism – Drinking age

The young aged alcohol drinker is one of the most serious aspects of alcoholism in New Zealand. According to the report by New Zealand Parliament (2003), “Consuming alcohol seriously affects the health and behavior of many teenagers”.  There are a number of concretely injuries of young alcoholism in New Zealand. For example, Kate (2010) reported that young student in King's College died from over drinking and there are much younger student faces on same risk. In other words, these young people could bought as many alcohols as they can be die from over drinking, Kate (2010) also suggested that it is easy to access to alcohol in New Zealand even only 13 years old people can buy it. In addition to that, New Zealand Parliament (2003) mentioned that the some children really started drinking in 13 – 15 years.  It is much more law than legal drinking age in New Zealand so it is clear that limitation for drinking age was not essentially working.  It might come from easy accessibility to alcohol as Kate says and also from the less enforced regulation for drinking which is the under 18 years people can also drink alcohol with regal guardian as International Centre for Alcohol Policies reported.   Though the government recognises this fault of law as well and try to change the law for sebral times. Beck (2010) reports Prime Minister John Key announced changes regulation for alcohol legislation in August. It is aimed to stop the widely spread of alcohol in many age groups of people. However there are some negative opinions for this change. YOUNG NUTTS (2010) suggest this plan miss out the significant aspects of young drinking in New Zealand that old aged heavy drinker will purchase and provide alcohol for young people. It can say that young alcoholism in New Zealand is one of the significant and serious aspects of whole alcoholism problems in New Zealand so it is difficult to change this drinking culture by only forbid alcohol for young people.

What consumers/we can do for alcoholism

According to the article in above, it can say the government tried to solve this social problem by laws but however it is not perfect plan as Young suggests. It means that consumer also needs to think about their responsibility for drinking. There are a number of ways to take their responsibility but one of the most important and basic measure is to think about the limit of drinking. However the permissible amount of alcohol is depends on the each person’s health; there are a number of ideas for limit of drinking in New Zealand that might be standard for consumer. For example, according to the article in Patient UK (2009), the suitable amount of alcohol per day is four units which is equal to 200ml of 20% alcohol drinks.  It is also necessary to care about drink drive limit that do not drive the car after drinking to avoid car accident. On the other hand, it is also important to work as a community to stop alcoholism especially for young people. Dr Sue (2010) said that to pay attention for accessibility to alcohol and control the demand for drinking, it is necessary to work as community because the alcoholism in New Zealand is like culture or trend in community so adults must be do something for young people to help them, not only by government.
In conclusion, alcoholism is serious social problem in New Zealand so people in this society must be cope with this problem by any ways whatever they can do. In my opinion, alcohol is a important element of life even make people good feeling, forget the stresses, make fun and enjoy with frriends. So we, the consumer need to take care about the alcohol to keep it good aspects of life, not as serioous, social problem.

Refferences:

Paula. S. (2007). Alcohol and young people. In Kiwi Families. Retrived from http://www.kiwifamilies.co.nz/Topics/Health/Drugs-Alcohol-Smoking/Alcohol-and-Young-People.html

NZPA .(2010). Alcohol-related deaths skyrocket. NZ heralds. In nzherald.co.nz.
Retrived from http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10654958

ANZPAA. (2009). Alcohol-misuse statistics. In ANZPAA.
Retrived from http://www.anzpaa.org/current-initiatives/alcohol-misuse-statistics

John,H, (2010). Government unveils new alcohol plans. NZheralds.
Retrived from http://www.stuff.co.nz/national/politics/4049000/Government-unveils-new-alcohol-plans

New Zealand Parliament.(2003). Alcohol and New Zealand teenagers, From the research papers of New Zealand Parliament.
Retrived from http://www.parliament.nz/en-NZ/ParlSupport/ResearchPapers/0/6/6/06680f50e5e74c5892231ea32075df5b.htm

Kate,N. (2010). Young teens drinking themselves to death. Nzherald.
Retirived from http://www.stuff.co.nz/national/health/3752872/Young-teens-drinking-themselves-to-death

Beck, V. (2010). Key: Drinking law plans due out soon. NZherald. In nzherald.co,bz.
Retrived from http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10666396.

YOUNG NUTTS. (2010). The Government misses the point in their plan for alcohol reform. In YOUNG NUTTS.
Retirived from http://www.youngnats.org.nz/2010/08/24/the-government-misses-the-point-in-their-plan-for-alcohol-reform/

EMIS (2009). Recommended Safe Limits of Alcohol. In Patient UK.
Retrived from http://www.patient.co.uk/health/Recommended-Safe-Limits-of-Alcohol.htm

Sue, B. (2010). Stop Scapegoating Young People. In Scoop politics.Retirived from http://www.scoop.co.nz/stories/PO1008/S00264/stop-scapegoating-young-people.htm