The head of an Austin organization working on homelessness included this caveat when she sent me her group’s thought-provoking new study on homelessness and alcoholism: “These concepts, unfortunately, could easily end up as fodder for those interested in ‘shock-jock’ type of reporting,” Helen Varty, executive director of Front Steps, said in her e-mail. “That is….
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Giving children alcohol at an early age increases their risk of becoming drink-dependent at a later stage in life, according to new research. The claim challenges the long-held notion that introducing children to alcohol in small measures over time may prevent teenage binge drinking. The new study, by the US National Institute on Alcohol Abuse….
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Richard started drinking a few glasses of red wine in the evening to relax and pass the time. But gradually a couple of glasses turned into a bottle – and then two. Without realising it Richard, a 51-year-old professional, was soon drinking 126 units a week – four and a half times more than the….
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Michael Walsh lost 16 years to alcohol and cocaine addiction. Now sober, he’s trying to help others find their way out through a new secular peer-support group called LifeRing. Alcoholics Anonymous was instrumental in his recovery, but as an atheist, Walsh, now 41, struggled with the concept of the higher power found in AA’s program…..
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We must fully debate our attitude to alcohol, or acknowledgment of our dysfunctionality will be suppressed, writes BRIAN O’CONNELL A soon-to-be-published study attempts to define, with some clarity, what the health consequences of our national hangover are. The report examined alcohol-attributable deaths and hospitalisation in Ireland from 2000 to 2004. In that period, one-in-10 bed-days….
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