Students and alcohol

As many as 70 percent of college students have admitted to having had sex,  mainly as a result of being under the influence of alcohol, or to having sexual intercourse with a person with which they wouldn't have had if they were sober.

The amount of alcohol consumed by college students each year is 1627 million liters, with which every university could fill an Olympic-sized pool.  Many administrators from colleges with low drinking levels and high-schools with high drinking levels say they have a key problem with alcohol linked damage to property.

Another problem with students and alcohol is that college drinkers have a high probability (27 percent) to be driving under the influence than the non-drinking students (20 percent). A dire statistic says that from the students currently in college, 300 000 will die as a result of alcohol related accidents (drink-driving, cirrhosis, cancer and heart disease).

But all is not lost. Statistics done in recent years in the US show that even on traditional college party nights 66 percent of students return with no alcohol in their blood. This means that 2 in 3 students don’t drink at parties, which is very encouraging. Also, the percentage of non-drinkers among students in the U.S. has reached a record-breaking all-time high in recent statistics.

How to find a solution


As an alternative to stigmatizing alcohol and scaring people into self-restraint, we need to show that it’s not alcohol itself but abusive alcohol drinking that poses the major problem. Teenagers are educated that if they drink, they must do so with restraint and responsibility. This has permitted many students to stay clear of alcohol abuse troubles that are overwhelming our society. >

Some statistics on students and alcohol drinking in college

    • 43 percent of students are binge drinkers and 21 percent binge habitually
    •  2 million students (18 to 24 years of age) were caught drink-driving last year.
    •  55 percent of female students and 75 percent of male students implicated in acquaintance rape have admitted that they’ve been drinking heavily or have been using drugs at the time of the incident.
    •  159 thousand of today's students in their first year will fail reaching their second year because of alcohol or drug related problems.
    • 31 percent of students were diagnosed with alcohol abuse and 6 percent have been identified with alcohol dependence in the last year.
    • 27 percent of students were caught under the influence of alcohol in the past year (that’s about 2,000,000 students)
    • As a result of alcohol consumption 5% of students in their 4th year have been implicated with the campus police.
    • 110 thousand students are caught by the police for an alcohol-related incident (drink-driving, public drinking)
    • Over 150 thousand students have an alcohol-related health problem, and  numbers as big as 1.5 percent of students have attempted to commit suicide last year because of alcohol abuse.