Liquor store owners and staff have reported that an increasing number of youngsters are frequenting their businesses in an attempt to purchase alcohol illegally.
The legal drinking age in South Africa is 18 and no person under this age may purchase alcohol.
However, brazen high school learners are regularly trying to buy alcohol personally or acquiring help from other older people to purchase it on their behalf.
One liquor store in Estcourt that sees this practice often is clamping down by holding back the cash that learners want to use to buy alcohol and explaining that it will be returned once their parents personally call at the store.
SEE THIS: Know the risks of underage drinking
One staff member told the Estcourt News that some learners arrive in the store in their school uniform, blatantly ignoring the liquor laws.
When the learners are questioned, they leave, without any answers. Underage drinking is a worldwide problem with serious physical and mental consequences.
If you see this happening, remember to report it to your local police station.
Some statistics from the South African Brewery on underage drinking:
• One in two teenagers in the average South African home is a user of alcohol.
• Almost half the learners (49 percent) interviewed in a recent secondary school survey said that they had drunk alcohol at some stage during their school career.
• In the same survey, 15 percent of boys and eight percent of girls said that they’d had their first drink before the age of 13.
• Having five or more drinks in a single session is considered to be binge drinking and makes you a problem drinker. Half of the students who admitted to drinking (23 percent to 35 percent) said that they had had a binge drinking session (had five or more drinks on one occasion) in the month before the survey.
• People who begin drinking before the age of 15 are four times more likely to develop alcohol dependence than those who have their first drink at age 20 or older.
• Teens that use alcohol are three times more likely to be involved in violent crime.
• Teenagers who drink are far more likely to try illegal drugs. In fact, research shows that 67 percent of teens who drink before the age of 15 will go on to use illegal drugs. They are 22 times more likely to use marijuana, and 50 times more likely to use cocaine.
• Some youth start abusing alcohol from age 12.
• 60 percent of grade eight to 11 learners who abused alcohol in a local research study had to repeat their grade.
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