BASSETERRE, St. Kitts - IN an effort to ease the growing number of teenagers being diagnosed with liver disease (Cirrhosis), calls are being made to lift the current age limit from 18 to 21 in most countries worldwide.
SKNVibes observed during the recent Carnival activities that there were a large number of teenagers consuming alcoholic beverages at parties and other social events.
Doctors in the United Kingdom (UK) have stated that binge-drinking teenagers have to be treated for liver diseases, “a dangerous condition normally associated with a decade or more of heavy drinking by adults, research has shown”.
In an article published by Metro.com, more teenagers aged 17, 18 and 19 have been found hospitalised with Cirrhosis.
The doctors lamented that “teenagers who drink heavily for months also have severe acute alcoholic hepatitis, which can be fatal after causing sudden inflammation of the organ”.
According to the Sunday Times out of the UK, over the past three years two 17-year-olds, an 18-year-old and a 19- year-old were treated for liver disease linked to binge drinking.
Moreover, Professor Rajiv Jalan, a consultant liver specialist at the Royal Free Hospital, warned that “the younger you are, the more likely it is that you will get damaged’.
He recommend that the government follow that of the United States and consider raising the age at which persons could buy from 18 to 21, noting that “we need to be clear about what is the safe age for dinking”.
A staggering number of young people worldwide have been suffering from liver disease, which has been linked to alcohol, forcing medical practitioners to rethink about the profession’s policy of not considering youngsters for a transplant if they were unable to show they could quit drinking.
This ruling made headlines in 2003 when then 22-year-old Gary Reinbach – who was suffering from Alcoholic Hepatitis after drinking heavily since he was 13 - died after he was refused a liver transplant.
Doctors however fear that girls and young women may be more at risk from the damage caused by binge drinking than teenage boys.
