In a public survey conducted by Community Against Drunken Driving (CADD) on underage drinking from 20 November – 31 December 2021 it was found that there has been an increase in underage consumption of alcohol and expenditure on alcohol and 89.4% of respondents had alcohol before the age of 21 years.
A survey conducted outside 50 prominent liquor vends, bars, restaurants etc of Delhi among 10,000 people, it was found that all the 10,000 respondents were below the age of 25 years out of which 5976 were male and 4024 were female.
The survey highlighted that the youth were able to purchase and consume alcohol at various places without any checks in place.
“It also bared facts on how the recent liberalization of the Delhi Excise act with proper monitoring and checking mechanism is pushing young people towards alcohol and addiction,” stated the press statement issued by CADD.
According to Prince Singhal , Activist, Road safety Expert and Founder CADD – Community against drunken driving, “Globally Alcohol use among young people is a matter of grave concern and we as a community have a very casual approach towards alcohol consumption among underage consumers.”
He said, “A study by WHO revealed that alcohol consumption increased by 38% between 2010 to 2017 and it grew by 21% during the COVID-19 pandemic. Underage consumers were a large contributor to this increase. The percentage of under -15 boys who have not had alcohol has decreased from 50% to 31% and the corresponding number for under-15 girls has gone down from 44% to 31%.”
Besides, some major highlights of the survey include 17% of respondents had consumed their first drink in the age 13-15 years while 37.1% people had their first drink in the age group 16- 18 years.
Almost 73.4% of respondents easily procured alcohol from bars, pubs, and liquor vends and 21.2% got their alcohol from their home or friends’ homes.
As per the survey, 43.1% of respondents had alcohol at a bar, pub, or restaurant and almost 24.6% had alcohol in a car or a public space.