The government should step up alcohol education and prevention efforts, and allocate more of the budget to it, doctors said on Friday, citing the high consumption of alcohol among Taiwanese adolescents.
One out of four 12-to-17-year-olds has consumed alcohol, said Yen Tsung-hai (顏宗海), director of Linkou Chang Gung Memorial Hospital’s Department of Clinical Toxicology.
The Health Promotion Administration (HPA) budgets NT$1.3 billion (US$43.9 million) annually to prevent the health hazards of tobacco, but it has not allocated a separate budget for preventing teenage drinking or excessive alcohol use, Yen said.
Photo: Tsai Tsung-hsien, Taipei Times
“There is no so-called ‘safe drinking level’ for minors,” because any amount consumed hinders their brain development, he said, citing the sensitivity of the hippocampus and the prefrontal lobe to ethanol.
“Ethanol is neurotoxic, and long-term drinkers are prone to liver disease and cirrhosis of the liver, as well as a higher risk of cardiovascular disease,” he added.
Teenagers who have a drinking habit can develop antisocial traits and experience low mood more easily, he said, adding that they also have a higher likelihood of being addicted to alcohol as adults.
Similar to how tobacco products were advertised in the past, commercials present alcoholic beverages as boosting the fun of social gatherings, and this perception of alcohol has contributed to a spike in underage drinking, said Guo Fei-ran (郭斐然), an attending physician in National Taiwan University Hospital’s Department of Family Medicine.
Convenience stores offer alcoholic drinks, including beer, cocktails and flavored alcoholic beverages, in the non-alcoholic drinks section, so young people who might have only wanted a soft drink could be easily tempted, Guo added.
The National Communications Commission from March last year required broadcast media not to show advertisements for alcohol before 9pm, but most teenagers go to bed later than that, he said.
No regulations have been introduced for advertising online when teenagers use the Internet the most, he said, adding that images and information related to alcoholic beverages are everywhere online.
“The loose regulations regarding alcohol are why underage people live in an environment full of alcohol,” he said, urging the government to implement new guidelines for online content showing alcoholic beverages.
Government agencies focus less on alcohol education and prevention for young people than on tobacco and drug prevention, but alcohol consumption is the cause of multiple health and social issues, Yen said.
“Hopefully, the government will add alcohol prevention as an item in its budget next year,” he added.
HPA Tobacco Control Division official Lu Meng-ying (呂孟穎) said that alcohol prevention is promoted through interministerial channels.
For example, police agencies are responsible for drunk driving prevention, while the Ministry of Health and Welfare’s Department of Mental and Oral Health is responsible for treating alcoholism, Lu said.
The HPA bundles alcohol prevention with its tobacco prevention, so the tobacco prevention funding is available to alcohol prevention efforts, typically in the form of special projects, he added.
Japanese footwear brand Onitsuka Tiger today issued a public apology and said it has suspended an employee amid allegations that the staff member discriminated against a Vietnamese customer at its Taipei 101 store. Posting on the social media platform Threads yesterday, a user said that an employee at the store said that “those shoes are very expensive” when her friend, who is a migrant worker from Vietnam, asked for assistance. The employee then ignored her until she asked again, to which she replied: "We don't have a size 37." The post had amassed nearly 26,000 likes and 916 comments as of this
US President Donald Trump said "it’s up to" Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) what China does on Taiwan, but that he would be "very unhappy" with a change in the "status quo," the New York Times said in an interview published yesterday. Xi "considers it to be a part of China, and that’s up to him what he’s going to be doing," Trump told the newspaper on Wednesday. "But I’ve expressed to him that I would be very unhappy if he did that, and I don’t think he’ll do that," he added. "I hope he doesn’t do that." Trump made the comments in
Tourism in Kenting fell to a historic low for the second consecutive year last year, impacting hotels and other local businesses that rely on a steady stream of domestic tourists, the latest data showed. A total of 2.139 million tourists visited Kenting last year, down slightly from 2.14 million in 2024, the data showed. The number of tourists who visited the national park on the Hengchun Peninsula peaked in 2015 at 8.37 million people. That number has been below 2.2 million for two years, although there was a spike in October last year due to multiple long weekends. The occupancy rate for hotels
A cold surge advisory was today issued for 18 cities and counties across Taiwan, with temperatures of below 10°C forecast during the day and into tonight, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said. New Taipei City, Taipei, Taoyuan and Hsinchu, Miaoli and Yilan counties are expected to experience sustained temperatures of 10°C or lower, the CWA said. Temperatures are likely to temporarily drop below 10°C in most other areas, except Taitung, Pingtung, Penghu and Lienchiang (Matsu) counties, CWA data showed. The cold weather is being caused by a strong continental cold air mass, combined with radiative cooling, a process in which heat escapes from
RSS