ALCOHOL ABUSE BY TEENS RISING

Worries About Drug Use Overshadow Drinking Problems

WATERLOO REGION -- The realities of teen drug abuse may be as misunderstood
as teens themselves.

Alcohol is abused by more Ontario teens than any other drug, but that
rarely makes the front page unless it causes a major accident.

Prescription drugs are in demand on the streets of Waterloo Region, but
police don't identify them as a major problem.

As a result, the message sent to impressionable teens and worried parents
is that the problem is abuse of high-profile, hard-core drugs like cocaine
and heroin.

"There tends to be a sensationalism of a huge drug problem and I think that
overshadows the alcohol and makes the alcohol a non-issue, when it is the
biggest issue," said Pat Fisher, health promotion officer with the Region
of Waterloo. "Most people drink alcohol and smoke marijuana, but they're
not doing the hard drugs."

A 2001 survey conducted by the Centre for Addiction and Mental Health found
36 per cent of Ontario Grade 7 students had tried alcohol. By Grade 11,
more than 80 per cent were drinking, and in OAC, it was 86 per cent.

That's double the number of teens who tried marijuana, the second most
popular drug.

"With alcohol, kids are drinking more and more often," Fisher said. "There
is a continually increasing number who are drinking to get drunk."

Between 1993 and 1999, the number of kids reporting binge drinking, defined
as five or more drinks on one occasion, jumped from 30 to 42 per cent.
"Those who are drinking think that's what you drink for," Fisher said.
"It's very troubling."

Because alcohol consumption becomes legal at age 19, and because parents
drink and may offer their young teens the occasional drink, children get
the message that it's OK to drink.

The majority of underage drinkers get their alcohol from home, and research
in several Ontario communities, notably Ottawa and Huron County, found
teens who are served alcohol at home drink more than those who aren't.

Local chapters of Alcoholics Anonymous have programs specifically for youth
and teens. Al-A-Teen in Kitchener offers open-door support groups for teens
with alcoholics in their family, but also offers closed-door meetings for
teenage alcoholics.

In Cambridge, depending on the needs of students at the time, St. Benedict
Secondary School may provide a weekly venue for students to meet and talk
with peers about their drinking problems.

Although parents are the most important role models in their children's
lives, teenagers drink differently from their parents.

"Kids tend to drink excessively and they drink very quickly," said Coba
Moolenburgh, director of St. Mary's Counselling Service, associated with
St. Mary's Hospital in Kitchener. "Adults tend to measure a drink or know
exactly how much they're drinking.

"We ask kids to open beers themselves and put all the caps in their pocket.
They're often amazed at how much they drink."

As kids get bored with one substance, usually cigarettes or alcohol, they
may begin abusing others, such as marijuana, ecstasy or cocaine.

"I took my first drink when I was 11 years old," said Wayne Brown, 51, of
Kitchener, who works with street youth and teen addicts at Reaching Our
Outdoor Friends (ROOF).

"By the time I was 13, I was into drugs, smoking pot and LSD, but alcohol
was still a prevalent thing. A case of beer was like water out of the tap.

"I started by abusing drugs and alcohol. When I became addicted, they
started abusing me."

In 1997, after 35 years of addiction and losing his fiancee to a drug
overdose, Brown checked himself into a 10-month rehabilitation program.

"Fear is probably the biggest factor in people preventing themselves from
getting help," he said. The fear is of friends and family finding out, and
fear of admitting to yourself that something is wrong.

Brown has been sober for almost five years, but said addiction is a disease
without a cure. "Instead of insulin, I take Alcoholics Anonymous and
Narcotics Anonymous."