Extreme Drinking, Extreme Living

For some college students, drinking is like a rite of passage. As they move from their parents' home to the dorm or a home of their own, many feel the need to prove themselves.

Unfortunately, extreme drinking often becomes part of that transition.

But drinking too much is dangerous, and puts students who consistently overdo it at significant risk of accident and injury.

The Facts about Extreme Drinking

According to experts, male students who binge drink consume at least five drinks per day, and females who binge at least four.

With that news under your belt, consider these surprising facts you may not know:

• 20 percent of men drink 10 or more drinks per day
• 10 percent of women drink eight or more drinks per day
• Nearly eight percent of men drink 15 or more drinks per day
• Nearly two percent of women drink 12 or more drinks per day

Surprised? We were! The number of students who consume two or three times more than the standard for even binge drinking is staggering—and puts our kids at greater risk than they realize.

The More They Drink, the More They Risk

We've all heard stories of frat boys and sorority girls who consume massive quantities of alcohol during initiation and wind up in the emergency room getting their stomachs pumped—or worse yet, pass out and die from alcohol poisoning.

But that's not the only risk to students who drink too much. Researchers have known for some time that accidents and injuries tend to accompany regular, heavy drinking. Now they know that male students who drink eight or more alcoholic drinks per day and females who drink five are 19 and 10 percent more likely to suffer drinking-related injuries, respectively.

Worse yet, the more alcohol that makes it down the hatch, the faster the rate of injury rises. That can mean anything from car accidents, to tripping and falling, to injuries sustained participating in extreme sports.

Communication & Prevention

For parents with college-age kids ready to take the leap toward higher education, we hope facts like these will inspire you to talk to your students about the dangers of extreme drinking and living.

Doing so may not only keep them healthy and alive; it may also help keep health insurance rates affordable, too.