Last updated 13:34, Friday, 28 March 2008

DETAILED statistics mapping the extent of alcohol-related illness in Cumbria call for more than disapproving condemnation of reckless youth and irresponsible behaviour.

So frequently do we shake our heads in criticism of the self-destructive tendencies of young people, all pretences at real concern have been lost. The worst happens to other people, other people’s kids. Not to us, not to our own. It was never like this in our day.

True enough, it never was. But older people who escaped youth’s adventuring with no more than a few memories of social drinking and occasional excess were always bound to miss the point of today’s critical cultural crisis.

The alcohol-obsessed nature of daily life now was created, not inherited. It bears no resemblance to the odd bottle of beer sneaked by a 16 or 17-year-old pretending to be of age at the pub’s out-sales window.

Booze is now an integral part of everyday life for too many children, who think nothing of downing spirits like pop – regardless or perhaps ignorant of the risks.

They have been encouraged to drink by parents who turn blind eyes or actively condone it; by retailers who promote strong booze as loss leaders, making it affordable, accessible and who are prepared to sell to anyone; by relaxed licensing laws which signal the desirability of all-day drinking; by adults, themselves caught in the drink culture trap, unwilling and unable to set a healthy example.

The many terrifying upshots of continuing to encourage developing young bodies to suffer destruction by potent poison are catalogued in shocking detail in The Cumberland News today.

Stopping the rot will come not by disapproval but by proactively and urgently reversing a culture that currently makes drinking heavily unavoidable.

And in hard times, with so much revenue riding on this country’s alcohol obsession, one wonders just who will have the stomach for that.