Drunk Driving Outline

Robert Voas states teen pregnancy, sexual assaults, and crime rates have increased due to underage drinking. Alcohol consumption at a college age leads to 600,000 physical assaults and 70,000 sexual assaults yearly according to a study (464). Joyce Alcantara claims if the age were lowered back to eighteen then it would put younger teens at risk (468). People tend to have friends around their same age. So, if eighteen year olds were allowed to drink then their friends which are roughly around the age of sixteen or seventeen would likely have an alcoholic drink in their hand as well. “There’s No Benefit to Lowering the Drinking Age” explains, on average about eleven teens die daily as a result of drunk driving (Voas 464). When teens throw a party, alcohol is usually involved. Then once the party is over the kids have to get home somehow and they often drive themselves. When an alcoholic drink is placed in an eighteen-year-old hand decisions are made that harm them and others

“Every year 500,000 teens are injured in a car wreck. Every year 5,000 teens die in a car wreck meaning an average of 14 teens die a day. Car crashes are the No. 1 killer of teens in the U.S. Even more than alcohol and drug abuse, violence and suicide”. Teens are always excited to earn their license and drive out on the road for the first time, but not every time will be a success, it might also be their last. I believe that teen’s cause more car crashes because they’re new to driving and don’t know the full responsibilities to the rules of the road. There are many different scenarios that lead to car wrecks, injuries and even deaths, such as texting while operating a vehicle, under the influence, and general lack of knowledge.

But while it has succeeded in that, it is also believed that tougher rules, such as DUI rules and seatbelt safety rules have also played a part in this decrease. However, this higher drinking age hasn’t reduced drinking, its only “driven it underground,” Gabrielle Glaser states in her NY Times article. It has been driven underground to the riskiest settings, high school parties and frat parties that are unsupervised. This age raise segregates the drinking away from adults that can model moderation in drinking. If an 18-year-old high school senior is shown by his/her parent(s) how to drink responsibly and in moderation, I believe that it would greatly help in reducing the chance of making bad decisions by overdoing it, such as driving while drinking. Teaching children to drink safely starting while they’re 18 and living with their parents will help them develop healthy habits which will stick with them, helping them drink

The drinking age has been a debate between the ages 18 to the age of 21 for a while now. Over the years, studies have showed favors toward the age of 21. People will oppose to this law, but at the age of 18 an adolescent's brain is not fully developed yet. Underage drinking is a common action in today’s society. What kids do not know is the effect that underage drinking has on their brain. Since the brain is not fully developed at the age of 18, drinking

“If the legal age were lowered in the US it would have to come with much more education in this area, not just the shock-value of Every 15 Minutes” said Ulrike Skillman, math teacher at Saugus. Skillman suggests the lowering of the drinking age will have to come with more alcohol education and that is the exact purpose of a “drinking license.” Which would allow 18 year olds to consume alcohol, with strict regulations, then take classes to officially receive a “drinking license” at 21 years old. The license would replicate a driver’s license, but be geared toward consuming alcohol.

When the Minimum Legal Drinking Age changed to 21 years old in 1976, there was a decrease in fatal car accidents which saved approximately 21,887 lives (Alcohol Policy MD). Many lives were saved because there were less young drinkers and less people driving under the influence of alcohol. If it were possible to save lives, why wouldn’t you want to do that? An argument is made that if teenagers are allowed the responsibility to drive when they are 16 years old why can’t they drink at an earlier age? This is simply because Alcohol can put people in danger. Drunk driving seems to be a black spot of our civilization. An average of 17,000 individuals die each year in drunk driving related accidents, and drunk driving continues to be an enormously important public safety issue (MADD). With lowering this drinking age we can only expect more cases of drunk driving and more lives are put in danger. The National Highway Transportation Safety Administration estimates that about 900 lives are saved annually due to fewer alcohol-related traffic crashes involving underage drivers. Surely, it should be a priority for the society to minimize the death toll from drunk driving. A higher Minimum Legal Drinking Age (MLDA) is effective in preventing alcohol-related deaths and injuries among teenagers and youth. When the MLDA has been lowered, injury and death rates increase, and when the MLDA is increased, death and injury rates decline (Wagenaar, 1993). In addition, a common argument among opponents of a higher MLDA is that because many minors still drink and purchase alcohol, the policy isn't working on minors. The evidence shows, however, that although many youth still consume alcohol, they still drink less and experience fewer alcohol-related injuries and deaths (Wagenaar, 1993). There is also an argument comparing the European alcohol and drunk diving among the youth compared to the United

Drunk driving is not something that happens occasionally. It happens everyday of the year. A lot of times, drunk driving victims aren’t the ones who have been drinking. They could be driving home from work one day and get hit by someone who has been drinking. How would you feel if you took someones life? You would have to deal with it for the rest of your existence. However, some people believe we are making too much of drunk driving. But take a look at these statistics. 50% to 75% of people who have been convicted of drunk driving still drive with an expired license. (Johnston) When we think about drunk driving, we think about teens. Teens are not the only ones who drink and drive but they are mostly the ones who make the wrong choices when it comes to drinking. One reason why teens drink and drive is because of peer pressure. Teens often get sucked in to drinking. They feel that it is “cool” to drink and drive. The one thing that teens don’t realize is how much one drink can do. One drink can change a life or often many lives in a

However, “90% of drunk driving deaths in the United States were found in the over 21 age group” (Gruenewald). For this reason, drunk driving is not directly correlated with the drinking age. In addition, the percent of drunk driving deaths in the United States has reduced at a slower rate than European countries where they have their legal drinking age at eighteen. This suggest that if lowering the drinking age was a success in Europe, it may also be effective here in the United States to diminish the amount of drunk driving deaths. This is because people that become injured due to alcohol or alcohol poisoning are afraid to report their injuries to the hospital or authorities out of fear of illegal consequences for underage drinking. Therefore, lowering the legal drinking age encourages teenagers to assist others from the dangers of drinking and

Drugs such as alcohol have an effect on all users, regardless of their age; however, alcohol has an especially harmful effect on teens since their bodies are still developing. Studies have shown that alcohol has numerous negative effects on a teen’s body and mental health; for example, a study conducted by the Center of Disease Control and Prevention stated that “alcohol consumption affects the brain’s frontal lobes, which is essential for functions such as emotional regulations, planning, and organization” (“Age”). Teens already have high emotions and difficulties planning and organizing; alcohol will only enhance teens’ struggle. The Center of Disease Control and Prevention also found that alcohol consumption at a young age can potentially cause chronic problems such as memory loss, depression, suicidal thoughts, and poor decision making (“Age”). Teens have a difficult enough time making decisions and organizing their lives, but adding alcohol to the mix will only make matters worse; their bodies are still developing, and they are still learning to be adults. Teens already struggle deciding what clubs to join, what colleges to apply for, what college to attend, what to major in, and much more. Teens should not be allowed to legally drink because alcohol consumption can affect their health and

In fact, the law may increase the amount of eighteen to twenty year olds who do drink. It has been shown that, especially in college-age students, there is a tendency to not do what they are told, on the contrary, they will do the exact opposite. The problem with the drinking age being twenty-one is that some students drink purely out of defiance). The number of fatalities is down in all age groups, not just teenagers, and cars driven now are much safer than the cars that were being driven in the early 1980’s, and teenagers are much safer drivers, which can be attributed to the decreased amount of fatalities. Also, in other countries that have lower drinking ages, the number of fatalities has

It apears that children who exprienced drinking at young age will also continously and habitually drink in the future once they grow up. They do not simple do this occasionally but it has become a frequent and habitual addiction (Christiansen et al. 7). In totality, drinking alcoholic beverages of teenagers is not is unhealthy, unsafe, and unacceptable. More and likely teens that drink are trailing behind in their education because of how alcohol affects them so bad. Some parents allow their children drink alcoholic beverages under certain circumstances with their

Today in the United States about 4,358 people under the age of 21 years old die each year from alcohol-related car crashes, homicides, suicides, alcohol poisoning, and other injuries such as falls, burns, and even drowning. More than 190,000 people under the age of 21 visited an emergency room for alcohol related reasons in 2008 alone. Alcohol related motor vehicle crashes kill someone every 31 minutes and non-fatally injure someone every two minutes. That’s a lot of people gone because they wanted to go out and party and not think about the consequences ahead. In this essay I’m gonna give you information to why Underage Drinking is very very bad for you.

The title of this article is A Host of Trouble by Emma Schwartz. It was published on September 29, 2007 in U.S. News & World Report.

Alcohol abuse and alcoholism seems like an issue that keeps getting increasingly worse each year in the United States. According to USA Today and Centers for Disease Control and Prevention both say that approximately 6 people die from alcohol poisoning, caused from binge drinking, each day, which amounts to roughly 2,200 people each year. The National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism says that “In 2013 an estimated 697,000 adolescents ages 12–17 (2.8 percent of this age group) had an [alcohol use disorder]” (“Alcohol Facts”). Something has to stop and something has to change from preventing this more because 6 people dying each day from binge drinking alone is a lot, not to mention that 12-17 year olds are having alcohol problems at such a young age. Lowering the drinking age will enforce this act even more, promoting more drinking in fact. It would be a more acceptable thing to do and people would be more open about it. Yes, it might be good that underage people are not drinking in private and are open about their drinking habits, but that still doesn’t mean it is healthy physically or

Drunk driving is the act of operating or driving a motor vehicle while under the influence of alcohol or drugs to the degree that mental and motor skills of the driver are impaired. Driving Under the Influence (DUI), also known as Driving While Intoxicated (DWI) is illegal and is considered as a serious crime in many countries. However the Blood Alcohol Content (BAC) limit for arresting a person may vary in different countries.