What lies beneath

According to the recently-published European School Survey Project on Alcohol and Other Drugs, a staggering 87 per cent of our 15- and 16-year-olds have consumed alcohol in the previous 12 months. More worrying is that the use of inhalants (16 per cent) and the use of pills in combination with alcohol (11 per cent) is almost twice as common as the European average.

This newspaper (Youths On Cannabis Double In Eight Years, March 27) also highlighted the fact that according to Espad the number of students dabbling in cannabis has practically doubled over eight years even though Maltese teenagers' use of the substance remained below the European average.

This Espad report, based on information gathered in 2007 on more than 100,00 European students based in 35 European countries, includes findings that have been described as "indicative although not alarming" by Sedqa clinical director George Grech. Dr Grech also called for both the upping of the minimum drinking age from 17 to 18 and for more enforcement of the law. More indicators: heavy episodic drinking "in the past 30 days" increased through the years in Malta, about 55 per cent of Maltese students had first tasted wine before the age of 13, just under 50 per cent had tried beer at that age, almost 40 per cent tried spirits between the age of 14 and 15 and about 35 per cent first sipped them when under 13.

In my critique of the financial estimates for the year 2009 falling under Youth in Parliament last November, I had specifically mentioned the problem of alcoholism and binge-drinking among our youths and adolescents as one of the most important challenges facing the policy makers in this field.

I had mentioned that, by way of example, adolescents buying a bottle of wine and literally "getting wasted" in the middle of the road in St Julians had become too common a sight for our liking. Only a few days ago, during a press conference by the Commission for Higher Education, University Rector Juanito Camilleri pointed out his concern regarding the massive attendance of Junior College students at the bars surrounding the area.

The problem is that alcohol consumption per se is only the tip of the problem. The real problem is what lies beneath. Why are our adolescents resorting to binge drinking?

Although I agree with the idea of raising the drinking age from 17 to 18 (only last November this was pushed up from 16 to 17), I believe that the way forward is education.

Firstly, the government should embark on a widespread educational campaign aimed directly and specifically at youths and adolescents informing them of the benefits of a life without excessive use of alcohol. From day one, the Labour opposition would be giving its full support to such an initiative.

At the same time, even with the risk of coming across as being too negative, I am totally unhappy with the level of law enforcement in this field. We have been failing miserably to enforce the law in terms of the consumption of alcohol by youths up to the age of 16. I fail to see how we, as a nation, can be effectively enforcing the law on a much larger bracket of youths - up to the age of 18 - overnight.

Secondly, we need to promote the so-called soft skills (like the ability of not succumbing to peer pressure and the ability to believe in oneself) and to push forward the healthy lifestyle model. In both issues we are lagging behind and we are still light years away from placing those two points high on the educational agenda.

A 2005 Pan-American health organisation study called Youth: Promoting Health Behaviour In Adolescents, for instance, explains that conventional measures aimed at curbing substance abuse, like raising alcohol prices in the different states in the US, had very limited effect on alcohol consumption among adolescents. What really made the difference was the promotion of a healthy way of life among youths by leading them to participate in sports, physical exercise and a healthy lifestyle.

Along the years, authors and thinkers alike have mused on the beauty of youth. In an intimate letter sent to his daughter in 1787, Thomas Jefferson told her that "the fortune of our lives... depends on employing well the short period of our youth".

It is our job to assist, help and encourage youth to savour and enjoy life and at the same time till and cultivate it sufficiently to provide fruit for life. In life's most self-defining juncture, we - educators, policy makers, parents, youth workers - must play an active role for the benefit of our youths.

We should lie beneath.

Dr Bonnici is the opposition spokesman on youth and culture.

owen@bonniciellul.com