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No rationale for parents to give alcohol to underage teens: Professor Richard Mattick tells The Washington Post

Image - No rationale for parents to give alcohol to underage teens: Professor Richard Mattick tells The Washington Post
Date Published:
21 Feb 2018

NDARC’s Professor Richard Mattick spoke to The Washington Post about a prospective cohort study that found there is no evidence to support the practice of parents providing alcohol to their teenagers to protect them from alcohol-related risks during early adolescence.

“Our study shows that there is no rationale for parents to give alcohol to adolescents younger than the legal purchase age,” Professor Mattick told The Washington Post.

“To reduce the risk of alcohol-related harm, parents should avoid supplying alcohol to children.”

The six year study of 1,927 teenagers aged 12 to 18 and their parents found that there were no benefits or protective effects associated with giving teenagers alcohol when compared to teenagers who were not given alcohol. Instead, parental provision of alcohol was associated with increased likelihood of teenagers accessing alcohol through other sources, compared to teenagers not given any alcohol.

The study was published in The Lancet Public Health journal and more information is available on the NDARC website.

To read the full article from The Washington Post please visit their website.