May 2012 Archives

By: Luke Short

HOPKINS COUNTY, KY (5/25/12)--For over 3 years, a bicycle helped Hopkins County, KY native Chad Davis, 34, to feed a dangerously addictive drug habit and, ultimately, drove him that much closer to absolute destruction. Today, however, that very same vehicle has become a major part of Chad's ongoing physical and spiritual salvation. In fact, his restorative experiences with cycling have even inspired him to form a public biking group called "Ride It Out" that he hopes will inspire others to make positive changes in their lives.

To learn more about Chad's life, his lengthy bout with addiction, and the Ride It Out group, SurfKY News got the chance to speak with the outgoing Madisonville, KY resident as well as his long time friend/Ride It Out advocate, Audrey Burns.

"Over the course of my life, I've done quite a few different drugs, but I never had anything consume me the way that Xanax [antidepressants] and other pharmaceuticals did," says Chad. "I was taking so many that I was basically running on autopilot. I bought pills illegally and I would buy over three full prescriptions every month. There were times when I would take more than 30 Xanaxs in a single day. Tolerance is a powerful and dangerous thing," says Chad. "There were times when my ex-wife would lay with me in bed and wait for my heart to beat because my system was moving so slow."

"I've known Chad as a friend for about eight years," says Audrey. "Me and my husband would go see him or I would talk to him on the phone when he was on pills, but it was so hard to understand what he was talking about. He would just blackout sometimes, too."

Though Chad never overdosed from abusing pharmaceutical medications, he says that he was once transported to Regional Medical Center in Madisonville to get treatment for fatigue and malnourishment.

"I was rushed to the emergency room one day because I would just stay up for days and not eat a single thing, and when I did eat, I would just go to sleep because my system couldn't keep up," says Chad.

After surviving approximately three years of intense drug use, however, Chad was arrested for the possession of marijuana in March of 2009 and soon decided to quit using drugs all together.

Though his arrest and the ensuing court-ordered drug testing were a big part of his decision, Chad's choice to stop using drugs following the incident was inspired and strengthened by his own willpower, the kindness of others, and, of course, his bicycle.

"When I was about to start taking the drug tests, I had one of the people I had bought pills from tell me that I was going to go into shock or have a panic attack and swallow my tongue, but I decided to quit everything cold turkey anyway," said Chad. "The Hopkins County Drug Court told me I had about five weeks to get sober and that I could keep using just a little, but I just quit everything. I was mad at the situation I had found myself in. It was terrible."

As Chad added, the police officers who arrested him, Josh Mitchell and Jason McKnight of the Madisonville Police Department, were very respectful to him during the arrest. As a result, Chad truly believes that they were "clearly serving as the hand of God in that instance."

Continue Reading: surfky.com

By Ryan Gorman / NEW YORK DAILY NEWS

A drunken man who was passed out on rail tracks was run over by 26 train cars in Canada -- and walked away without a scratch.

The 8,000-ton Canadian Pacific Railway freight train was speeding down the tracks May 20 in eastern British Columbia when the engineer noticed the man in his 20s lying on the tracks.

The engineer blasted the horn and slammed on the brakes, but to no avail. Railway workers found the man under the 26th car.

"The guy seemed to wake up and he got up, grabbed his beer and just walked away," Royal Canadian Mounted Police Sgt. Dave Dubnyk told the Alberta Sun.

Railway workers feared he was dead at first, but the man - who's name hasn't been released - had no injuries and, aside from being visibly intoxicated, was no worse for the wear.

"I don't know how you wouldn't wake up even being that passed out drunk, how you wouldn't wake up from that train rumbling over top of you with the brakes screeching," Dubnyk told the National Post.

People rarely survive being run over by trains, and those that do often lose limbs or suffer other injuries.


Continue Reading: nydailynews.com

By Brian Skoloff Associated Press

SALT LAKE CITY -- A police officer who had been asked to check for drugs on a bus full of Utah teenagers headed to Disneyland ended up arresting the driver, authorities said Friday.

About 100 students who had graduated on Thursday from Canyon View High School in Cedar City were aboard the charter bus for their senior trip, Cedar City police Lt. Darin Adams said. Parents and faculty members had asked police to have a dog check students' bags for drugs before departure.

Two officers boarded the bus with a dog and immediately noticed driver Brandon Gillman, 30, of South Jordan, behaving suspiciously, Adams said.

He was fidgety, removing items from his backpack and stuffing them in his pockets, and then trying to leave the bus, Adams said.

"They saw some things that didn't add up, and their instincts kicked in," Adams added.

The dog, as well, was interested in the driver's bag.

Adams said the officer found prescription pills, drug paraphernalia and what is believed to be cocaine in the backpack.

Gillman failed a field sobriety test and was arrested on suspicion of possession of a controlled substance, possession of drug paraphernalia and driving under the influence, Adams said.

"This is a great day because we averted a tragedy," Canyon View High School Principal Richard Nielsen told the Deseret News. "In my mind, there's a strong likelihood that we (would be) having a mass memorial service."

Continue Reading: mercurynews.com

Binge drinking wreaks havoc on young people's lives -- and may raise the risk of alcoholism in their future

By: Erika Christakis

Proposed changes to the psychiatric profession's diagnostic manual, the DSM-5, have caused a recent uproar, with critics worried that the new label of "alcohol abuse disorder" will overdiagnose young problem drinkers -- as many as 40% of college students -- who eventually outgrow their dysfunctional behavior. Editors of the DSM-5 countered that the change in definition won't increase diagnosis, but the whole debate is merely a sideshow. As a member of Harvard University's Alcohol and Other Drug Services Executive Committee, I know firsthand that drinking among young adults is still a very serious problem that needs treatment.

Whether or not problem drinkers become alcoholics later in life -- and there's evidence that many of them do -- we can't ignore the hard reality that college binge drinking plays a central role in campus deaths, sexual assaults, physical injuries, destruction of property, failing academic performance, unintended pregnancies, STDs, depression, domestic violence and other mental-health problems.

The statistics are truly sobering. Every year, more than 3 million students between ages 18 and 24 drive while drunk. Alcohol accounts for 1,850 annual deaths in that age group, including deaths from car crashes and suicide. Almost 600,000 are injured under the influence of alcohol and another 700,000 have been assaulted by an intoxicated student. Around 400,000 had unprotected sex as a result of intoxication and 100,000 reported being too drunk to give consent for sex. Eleven percent of college drinkers damaged property. A quarter report academic difficulty due to alcohol use, while 150,000 college students have alcohol-related health problems.


Continue Reading: time.com

'Play Safe' gets its anti-drug message across -- by showing young people how to use drugs

John Keilman

Back in the '80s, schools had no problem using fear as a learning tool. Highway patrolmen visited my junior high with crash scene photos of shredded drunken drivers. Teachers showed us "Scared Straight," a documentary in which prison inmates threaten visiting delinquents with rape. I even remember hearing that AIDS had turned kissing into a potentially lethal act.

Then there were drugs. This was the peak of the "Just Say No" era, and our classroom lessons wallowed in all the ways drugs could kill us or turn us into subhuman monsters. I still recall a movie about PCP in which the narrator -- I think it was Paul Newman -- told a story about an intoxicated mother cooking her baby in a frying pan.

In retrospect, this approach probably wasn't a great idea. Young people sneer at danger, especially when they think it's overhyped. National surveys show that rates of teen substance abuse were higher in the 1980s than they are today, when drug education generally strives for a more scientific and measured tone.

Yet I must confess that for me, the scare tactics worked. My friends laughed off those factually challenged, emotionally manipulative filmstrips and "After School Specials," but I remembered them vividly, and I can honestly say they helped keep me on the straight and narrow (more or less) through college and beyond.

Now that I'm a parent, I think a lot about the tension between fear and facts. I want to keep my children far away from drugs, and I would be happy for schools to engage in fright-mongering if I thought it would work. These days, though, the Internet makes it easy for kids to cross-check any information they receive. If they discover gross exaggerations, won't they think everything they hear about drugs is a lie?

Continue Reading: chicagotribune.com

Police in Dubuque, Iowa, responded to an unusual call this week: reports of a zebra and a parrot in the front seat of a truck parked outside a bar. The striped animal and his fine feathered friend were there to keep their owner company, but weren't allowed in the bar.

Jerald Reiter, 55, told police the zebra and maccaw parrot enjoy going for rides in his truck, so he brought them to the bar, which he says usually allows animals inside, ABC affiliate KCRG-TV reports.

When the motley crew got to the bar, they were told because food was being served, the animals wouldn't be allowed inside. Bar owners told KCRG no animals are ever allowed inside.

When officers arrived on the scene, they stopped Reiter in the parking as he was driving his truck away. Field sobriety tests found he had a blood alcohol level of .14, nearly twice the legal limit, according to police.

His girlfriend, Vickie Teters, told KCRB the animals are like their children, and do everything with them.

Continue Reading: abcnews.com

By: Genevra Pittman

NEW YORK (Reuters Health) - Doctors know that drinking, drugs and risky sex go together in young people -- and a new study suggests loud music should be added to that list.

In the report from The Netherlands, researchers found that teens and young adults who spent a lot of time listening to loud music -- already risky because of the long-term chance of hearing loss -- were also more likely to smoke marijuana, binge drink and have sex without a condom.

"I think they've really shown that sex and drugs go with rock and roll," said Dr. Sharon Levy, head of the Adolescent Substance Abuse Program at Boston Children's Hospital who wasn't involved in the new study

But, Levy said, it's far too early to warn parents that listening to loud music could lead to drug or alcohol use.

The study couldn't show that one type of risky behavior led to the other, she pointed out. And it didn't answer another important question: what type of music, exactly, were study participants listening to?

Researchers led by Ineke Vogel at Erasmus MC University Medical Center in Rotterdam surveyed 944 students from inner-city vocational schools, aged 15 to 25, about their music-listening habits and other typical behavior.

Continue Reading: chicagotribune.com

By JESSE McKINLEY

A group of prominent addiction doctors has mounted a quiet legal campaign on behalf of Cameron Douglas, the troubled son of the actor Michael Douglas, in hopes of finding a sympathetic ear for their view that drug addiction is best handled with more treatment, not more prison time.

In December, Mr. Douglas, who is 33 and already serving a five-year federal sentence for drug distribution and heroin possession, was sentenced to an additional four and a half years after being caught behind bars with heroin and Suboxone, a prescription medication used to blunt the pull of opioid addiction.

And it was that sentence, believed to be one of the harshest ever handed down by a federal judge for drug possession for an incarcerated prisoner, that prompted about two dozen addiction doctors and groups to file a brief on behalf of Mr. Douglas, whose case is under review by a panel from the United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit.

Their argument is that Mr. Douglas, who began injecting heroin daily in his mid-20s, is a textbook example "of someone suffering from untreated opioid dependence" and that more prison time would do nothing to solve his underlying problems.

"My outrage is as a physician for someone who has a medical condition which has been ignored," said one of the brief's signees, Dr. Robert Newman, the director of the Baron Edmond de Rothschild Chemical Dependency Institute at Beth Israel Medical Center. "What the judge has imposed has zero benefits for the community and has staggering consequences for society."

Continue Reading: nytimes.com

By: David Morgan

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. crime statistics show illegal drugs play a central role in criminal acts, providing new evidence that tackling drugs as a public health issue could offer a powerful tool for lowering national crime rates, officials said on Thursday.

An annual drug monitoring report, released by the White House Office of National Drug Control Policy, also showed a decline in the use of cocaine since 2003, a sign that drug-interdiction efforts and public education campaigns may be curtailing the use of the drug's powder and crack forms.

The rate of overall illegal drug use in the United States has declined by roughly 30 percent since 1979.

But Thursday's report, based on thousands of arrestee interviews and drug tests, showed that on average 71 percent of men arrested in 10 U.S. metropolitan areas last year tested positive for an illegal substance at the time they were taken into custody.

The figures ranged from 64 percent of arrests in Atlanta to 81 percent in Sacramento, California, and were higher for nearly half of the collection sites since 2007.

U.S. officials held up the data as evidence to support President Barack Obama's strategy aimed at breaking the cycle of drugs and crime by attacking substance abuse with treatment rather than jail for nonviolent offenders.

"Tackling the drug issue could go a long way in reducing our crime issues," Gil Kerlikowske, head of the office that issued the report, told Reuters in an interview.

"These data confirm that we must address our drug problem as a public health issue, not just a criminal justice issue."

The arrest figures included men taken into custody on more than one charge as well as those arrested in drug busts.

Continue Reading: chicagotribune.com

Researchers at Yale University are testing a pill that could keep you from getting drunk -- but wait before sprinting to your local bar for that last beer. The drug, called iomazenil, is designed to stop brain cells from suffering the effects of booze. Men ages 21-35 will be given the drug, followed by alcohol, then will be asked to "drive" on a simulator, The Independent reports. If iomazenil works like Dr. Deepak D'Souza thinks it might, college students needn't worry about their keggers morphing into Kierkegaard class. The drug would be used to help alcoholics fight their addictions, not bring sobriety to the masses.

Continue Reading: msn.com

Most college binge drinkers and drug users don't develop lifelong problems. But new mental-health guidelines will label too many of them addicts and alcoholics.

By Maia Szalavitz

Are you or have you ever been a college binge drinker? Welcome to alcoholism, a diagnosis your college self could qualify for under the changes proposed to the next edition of psychiatry's diagnostic manual, the DSM 5.

As the New York Times noted on Saturday in an article that rapidly became one of the most emailed, DSM 5 will have just one diagnosis for addiction problems, though it will be characterized as either mild, moderate or severe. Currently, alcohol and other drug problems come in two flavors.  The first, "substance abuse" is a short-term, self-limiting problem: it encompasses most heavy drinking in college.  The second "substance dependence," is what everyone else calls addiction or alcoholism and is typically chronic and marked by relapses.

Fortunately, the new diagnosis will get rid of the confusing term "dependence" (physically needing a drug to function isn't actually addiction) and the stigmatizing term "abuse." Unfortunately, however, it will also tremendously elevate the number of people considered alcoholics.  One Australian study suggested that using DSM 5 definitions will increase the number of people diagnosed with alcoholism by a stunning 60%.


Continue Reading: time.com

Photo: An ad Project Prevention has used to encourage addicts to obtain long-term birth control.

By Rheana Murray

Founder launched group after adopting four children from a crack addict

A controversial nonprofit group is seeking out drug-addicted women and paying them cold hard cash to get sterilized.

The group, Project Prevention, hangs stark ads in clinics and homeless shelters to reel in drug users. The posters feature hard-hitting taglines such as, "Don't let a pregnancy ruin your drug habit," and "She has her daddy's eyes ... and her mommy's heroin addiction."

Barbara Harris, founder of the program, insists she is only trying to help prevent unwanted pregnancies, which often lead to children being fed into an overwhelmed foster care system, and that she's not forcing anyone to get sterilized.

"I think it's really important for people to understand that the majority of women we sterilize are women who have had multiple children and don't want anymore," she told the Daily News. "It's their decision."

"And to say, 'Let's go ahead and let them keep having babies because one day they might decide to clean up and keep one?' It's just not fair," she said. "And it's preventable."

Harris said that the last 20 women she paid to get sterilized had been pregnant a total of 121 times.

"Thirty were either aborted, stillborn or died after being born," she said. "Seventy-eight are in foster care."

Betsy Hartmann, director of the Population and Development Program and professor of Development Studies at Massachusetts' Hampshire College, has accused Project Prevention of "thinly disguised" racism.


Continue Reading: nydailynews.com

Recovering addict Evan James copes with life transition through painting

By: Amy Smart

Evan James, with one of his paintings at Pacifica Housing's Camas Gardens, is among the dozen formerly homeless artists whose works are on display at Island Blue Art Store.
Photograph by: Bruce Stotesbury, Times Colonist , Times Colonist


Evan James says making art helped him survive five years living on the street.

"I think that's the only thing that kept me going when I was homeless," he said. "It kind of kept me in a positive spirit."

Now 33, the recovering alcoholic is one of 12 formerly homeless artists whose work will be displayed at Island Blue Art Store this month. Each of the participants is a tenant of one of Pacifica Housing's four supported complexes for individuals who are chronically homeless or at risk of becoming homeless.

The exhibit marks a full circle for James, who used to spend a portion of his panhandling money on canvases and art supplies from Island Blue.

"That's where I was getting my supplies," he said.

"If I made like eight dollars, that would be enough to get a canvas."

James grew up in Duncan, where he says he had a troubled youth that included several run-ins with police. He was kicked out of high school for fighting with another student.

"It got pretty violent," he said. "There was a lot of racism at that school."

He started drinking at 17 - first only on weekends, but it devolved from there.

Continue Reading: timescolonist.com

By: Jane Bradley and Rita Monjardino

Evidence of illegal drugs being used by children as young as 14 attending supposedly "safe" all-night raves has been uncovered by a BBC London investigation.

Let's Go Crazy (LGC) is a popular clubbing event which markets itself as a safe night out for over 16s where drugs will not be tolerated.

It hires out venues across London for its all-night events.

On its website Lets Go Crazy promises "unforgettable nights out for young people" and claims the "safety of our guests is our most important priority".

It adds: "Under no circumstances will the possession or consumption of drugs be tolerated."
Tighter security

The last LGC event was in April at The Coronet in Elephant and Castle, which finished at 05:30 BST. It was a sell out with about 2,400 teenagers attending.

But secret filming by BBC London journalists who attended the night reveals apparent drug use among clubbers, many younger than 16, and evidence of teenagers offering to supply drugs.

Two days before the event was due to take place, LGC announced there would be tighter security than at previous LGC events there.

One of the BBC journalists texted an LGC promoter asking why security was so strict.

Continue Reading: bbc.com

By Associated Press

PORTLAND, Ore. -- Actor Matthew Fox, star of the television series "Lost," has been charged with drunken driving in Oregon.

Police in Bend say the 45-year-old who lives in the Central Oregon city was stopped early Friday after an officer noticed a motorist failing to signal properly or stay within a lane of traffic.

During the stop, the officer decided Fox was driving under the influence and took him to the Deschutes (duh-SHOOTS') County Jail.

Fox was released Friday after he was booked into custody. He has a court appearance scheduled for June 17.

Continue Reading: washingtonpost.com

By: Ted Garcia

Drunk driving continues to be a big problem in San Antonio, and a local judge says he's fed up.

To combat the problem, Judge Carlo Key has turned to a new piece of technology that he hopes will make a life-saving difference.

"Our numbers are off the charts," said Key, "And I worry on a daily basis for the safety of the people on our roads and our families."

Key says what happened this past Fiesta should be a wake-up call. He's talking about the 373 D.W.I. arrests, which is a 45% increase from 2010. He says it takes 20 to 24 hours to try a D.W.I. case on average.

"So, just based on that, if we were to try all the cases that we picked up during this past Fiesta alone, that's 9,000 hours of trial time, " said Key. "So, that's 1,000 work days, eight hours a day truing these cases."

Recently, Judge Key came across a new took that he says could make a difference.

It's a device called SoberLink that remotely monitors a person's sobriety.

Continue Reading: foxsanantonio.com

By: Samantha Chang

Pop star Lady Gaga, a fitness fanatic who works out daily and follows a strict diet, says loneliness fueled her drug addiction during her post-high school years.

"I started doing cocaine because it was like the drug was my friend," Gaga, 26, said on the Conversation with Amanda de Cadenet talk show May 3, 2012 (see video at left). "I never did it with other people. It's such a terrible way to fill that void, because it just adds to that void, because it's not real."

She continued: "I began to cherish my loneliness. I have, sort of, since I was around 20 years old. I was very depressed when I was 19. I decided to pursue music, so I dropped out of school and I told my parents I didn't want any money from them. I got three jobs and I just hit the ground running.

"I would go back to my apartment every day and I would just sit there. It was quiet and it was lonely. It was still. It was just my piano and myself. I had at television and I would leave it on all the time just to feel like somebody was hanging out with me."

Continue Reading: examiner.com

By: Join Together Staff

Poor impulse control may be pre-wired in some teenagers, suggests a new study. Researchers have identified brain networks that are linked to impulse control and drug addiction, which may exist even before someone is exposed to alcohol or drugs.

Researchers at the University of Vermont performed a brain imaging study that included almost 1,900 14-year-olds, ABC News reports. They used a functional MRI, which permitted them to see how different parts of the brain work together. The teens were asked to perform repetitive tasks, and then were asked to stop mid-task, while the researchers measured their ability to do so. People who abuse drugs or alcohol tend to perform poorly on this test, the news report notes.

The study identified teens who had previously been exposed to alcohol, illicit drugs or nicotine, and could recognize specific brain patterns linked with early experimentation with these substances. Teens who had poor impulse control, but did not have a history of substance abuse, had similar brain images to those teens who already had used these substances.

Continue Reading: drugfree.org

By Mary Ellen Godin

HARTFORD, Conn, May 1 (Reuters) - Connecticut took a major step toward becoming the 49th state to allow Sunday alcohol sales when the Senate voted on Tuesday to allow liquor stores to sell beer, wine and spirits any day of the week.

Governor Dannel Malloy pledged to sign the bill that passed the Senate on a 28-6 vote following similar approval by the House. He said such sales would help Connecticut hang onto dollars that had been flowing on Sundays to neighboring Rhode Island, Massachusetts and New York.

Malloy's signature will leave Indiana as the only state in the country to ban all alcohol sales on Sunday, said Frank Coleman, spokesman for the Distilled Spirits Council of the United States.

"Our current laws have cost Connecticut businesses millions of dollars as consumers have flocked over our borders in search of more convenient hours and lower prices," Malloy said in a statement. (Writing by Barbara Goldberg; ; Editing by Sandra Maler)

Continue Reading: huffingtonpost.com

Plenty of chatter has persisted over the years about what impact, if any, Bobby Brown may have had on Whitney Houston's life and career, and now the late legend's ex is speaking out.

In an interview that's set to air on the "Today" show Wednesday, the R&B singer says that for one thing, he's not responsible for Houston's battle with drug use. According to Brown, Houston's use of substances began "way before" they met.

"I didn't get high [on narcotics] before I met Whitney," Brown told "Today's" Matt Lauer. "I smoked weed, I drank the beer, but no, I wasn't the one that got Whitney on drugs at all... It's just unexplainable how one could, you know, [say that I] got her addicted to drugs. I'm not the reason she's gone."

Houston's life was cut short in February of this year due to an accidental drowning, with the "effects of atherosclerotic heart disease and cocaine use" being contributing factors, according to an autopsy report.

Continue Reading: cnn.com

By Liz Szabo

The number of babies born addicted to the class of drugs that includes prescription painkillers has nearly tripled in the past decade, according to the first national study of its kind.

About 3.4 of every 1,000 infants born in a hospital in 2009 suffered from a type of drug withdrawal commonly seen in the babies of pregnant women who abuse narcotic pain medications, the study says. It's published today in The Journal of the American Medical Association.

That's about 13,539 infants a year, or one drug-addicted baby born every hour, says the study's lead author, Stephen Patrick, a fellow in neonatal-perinatal medicine at the University of Michigan.

Treating drug-addicted newborns, most of whom are covered by the publicly financed Medicaid program, cost $720 million in 2009, the study says.

The country has an obligation to help these newborns, who "have made no choices around drug abuse and addiction" and are "the most vulnerable and the most blameless" members of society, says Marie Hayes, a psychology professor at the University of Maine who was not involved in the study.

Continue Reading: usatoday.com

The greater the familiarity with the ads, the greater these risks, researchers say

By: Mary Elizabeth Dallas

SUNDAY, April 29 (HealthDay News) -- Kids who recognize fast-food advertisements on TV are more likely to be overweight, and those familiar with TV ads for alcoholic beverages are more likely to drink, according to two new studies from Children's Hospital at Dartmouth-Hitchcock Medical Center.

In one study, researchers questioned more than 2,500 young people ranging from 15 to 20 years old about their exposure to alcohol, if they had a favorite alcohol ad, and if they owned alcohol-branded merchandise, among other behaviors.

After being shown 20 images from the most popular TV ads for alcohol and 20 ads for fast food, with the brand names removed, the participants were then asked if they remembered the ads, liked the ads and knew about the products being advertised.

The researchers found that 59 percent of kids drank and 49 had engaged in binge drinking at least once the previous year. Familiarity with TV alcohol advertising was much higher among the drinkers than nondrinkers, and having alcohol-branded merchandise or having a favorite alcohol ad was linked to more hazardous drinking.

The studies were scheduled for presentation Sunday at the Pediatric Academic Societies' annual meeting in Boston.

"At present, the alcohol industry employs voluntary standards to direct their advertising to audiences comprised of adults of legal drinking age," said study lead author Dr. Susanne Tanski, an assistant professor in the department of pediatrics at Children's Hospital at Dartmouth, in a news release from the American Academy of Pediatrics.

"Our findings of high levels of familiarity with alcohol ads demonstrate that underage youth still frequently see these ads," Tanski added. "While this study cannot determine which came first, the exposure to advertising or the drinking behavior, it does suggest that alcohol advertising may play a role in underage drinking, and the standards for alcohol-ad placement perhaps should be more strict."

Continue Reading: msn.com