• Question: Why does drinking alchohol affect children more than adults?

    Asked by mary98 to Damien, Rachael, Simon, Suzi, Tim on 17 Jun 2011.
    • Photo: Suzi Gage

      Suzi Gage answered on 17 Jun 2011:

      Hi @mary98
      Great question!
      Alcohol has negative effects on people of all ages (unfortunately), but when you’re young it can do you more harm, because your body is still developing.
      Someone earlier asked me whether alcohol at a young age can stunt your growth, this is what I replied to them:

      Alcohol has different effects on teenagers compared to adults, but a little bit of alcohol as a teenager is not likely to do you a lot of harm (no more than it would an adult anyway).

      However, because you’re growing a lot in your early teens, it is thought that lots of alcohol at this time can negatively affect the levels of certain hormones in your body, which may slow down or alter your normal development. It doesn’t necessarily mean you’ll be shorter, but it might affect other things developing around that time, like your reproductive system for example.

      There’s more information here

      http://pubs.niaaa.nih.gov/publications/aa67/aa67.htm

      Hope this answers your question 🙂

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