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Santa Rosa, Calif. ‐ A new four‐page guide emphasizes that parents can influence their teen’s alcohol use.

“Parents can play a powerful role in preventing teen drinking by understanding the risk
factors and behaviors which lead to it, by being good role models with regard to their own use of alcohol, and by joining with other adults to reduce teen access to alcohol in the community,” said Dr. Mary Maddux‐González, Sonoma County Public Health Officer.

Underage Drinking in Sonoma County helps debunk the myth that teen drinking is an acceptable and inevitable right of passage by presenting the health impacts and consequences associated with risky behavior:

• Alcohol use can damage areas of a teen’s developing brain that are responsible for planning, decision making, learning and memory. These changes can be long‐term and irreversible.

• Alcohol addiction is significantly higher in adults who start to drink as young teens. For every year that youth delay drinking, the chances of having an alcohol abuse disorder decrease.

• Teens that drink are more prone to impulsive behaviors that put them at risk of injury including binge drinking, driving under the influence, fighting and unprotected sexual activity. 31% of 11th graders in Sonoma County have driven a car after drinking or been driven by a friend who has been drinking.

“Parents can not start too early talking with their children,” according to Bill Haigwood of the California Parenting Institute.

“By 7th grade 25% of Sonoma County students have already had their first full drink. Parents need to know that parental disapproval of alcohol use and sustained supervision during the teen years can be key reasons that teens choose not to drink.”

To obtain a copy of the Guide to Underage Drinking in Sonoma County, visit www.sonomacounty.org/mcah. A Spanish translation will be available April, 2010.

The guide was developed by the Sonoma County Maternal, Child & Adolescent Health Advisory Board. It was made possible through the support of the Sonoma County Department of Health Services, Sonoma County Office of Education, California Department of Public Health and California Department of Alcohol and Drug Programs.