Let's raising the drinking age - four teenagers have got ill!

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So says Professor Rajiv Jalan:

‘The younger you are, the more likely it is that you will get damage.’

He also said the government should consider raising the age at which people can buy booze from 18 to 21, like in America.

‘We need to be clear about what is the safe age for drinking,’ he said.

This is because in England, in the last year, four - that's right, four - teenagers (two 17, one 18 and one 19) have been admitted to hospital with cirrhosis of the liver.

I'm guessing that these teenagers have been drinking - illegally - for some long while and considerable amounts to get into this condition. Does this nannying fussbucket of a doctor really think that raising the drinking age to 21 would have helped these children? Really?

I don't know how many teenagers there are in England but I'm guessing at six million plus. And the doctor wants another ban because four of those six million got into trouble with drinking?

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Thoughts following a short stay in a Bradford coffee shop

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Scene: Starbucks.

Present: large numbers of teenagers doing what teenagers do these days – playing with mobile phones, flirting, flitting from table to table. Some are sat in the corner in pairs enjoying young love – one couple even enjoy a surreptitious snog. Others are firmly positioned in groups of boys and girls eyeing the opportunities across the aisle. Girls show off their latest shoes, bags and bangles. Boys chunter about football, cars and, of course, girls.

Nothing unusual about this of course. Perfectly normal teenage behaviour. But for one thing – these kids don’t fit our stereotype. They are Asian. But there’s not a single hat or beard on the boys, not one is in a shalwar kameez with short legs and none of the girls is even wearing a headscarf, let alone a hijab. These are ordinary kids with normal aspirations – good jobs, nice house, decent car, a happy relationship. They are not tomorrow’s terrorists. They are not the thin end of a militant islamist wedge. They are just Bradfordians.

…perhaps we can start treating them as such?

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