Doctors urge radical reduction in blood-alcohol limits & increasing drinking age

[poppa smurf]

Originally Posted by Express

Sure let them advise the public of the harm and consequences but then it should be up to the individual to be allowed to decide if they wish to heed to that advice or not.

I agree wholeheartedly but in alcohol instances these individuals then get themselves into varying difficulty which makes alcohol and drugs their worst enemy. fighting, jumping off balconies, driving.

we, the emergency services must then fight the alcohol and drugs in their system in order to administer life saving equipment with the patient or on lookers are fighting us all the way.

the person would not act in this way if he/she were not affected by alcohol or drugs.


Not at the expense of everyone else, this is why we are slowly losing all our freedoms and becoming a nation regimented by rules and laws to protect a minority from themselves. Life is about choices and risks, let us be happy and free to live it that way.

unfortunately it is another case of "minorities ruining it for the majority"......I imbibe, a family, friends gathering more often than not involves the demon drink but No 1 I will never drive after a few drinks nor any of my friends or family, regardless of what the statistics show, I am on the coal face and have witnessed the outcome.

our freedoms (if we ever had such a thing) and rights (a whole different issue again) are being eroded by the few amongst us that are creating a position of danger to the masses with law makers reacting accordingly (rightly or wrongly).

we, the emergency services, must pick up the pieces of a drunken Saturday night too many times, some see it as fun to bash the head in on a total stranger then plead not guilty through alcohol,

drive too fast, act obnoxiously in public and generally behave like dicks simply because they are drunk.

I don't wholeheartedly agree with what the doctors are saying but I have also seen the "other side".....hospital staff abused and attacked for trying to help, ambo's having to be protected against the very people they are there to help, emergency services personnel having to fight their way to a crash scene.

sons and daughters doing irrational things that they regret in the morning and would not normally do.

alcohol has become such an intrinsic part of society that many people now see it as a right of passage, the hotels industry will lobby to the death against any lockout laws that are designed to make our streets safer but will not support our local footy.

we can't get volunteers anymore because they "can't be stuffed".......our footy, soccer, netball teams, emergency services can't get volunteers, ambo's can't get staff, systems, that uphold a whole town, are failing through lack of participants, society as a whole is failing our young.

drink is one problem, drugs are another, degradation of the family system is what I blame.

just let me correct one statement that is being echoed throughout this post.......I do not blame the young, nor did I say that it was restricted to the young, they are the victims of the breakdown of the morals of society, without direction they react in the simplistic of ways, the only way they know how.

I remember the "6 o'clock swill......even then there was consternation amongst more folks about that than there were participants......hence why it changed.

anyway, my two bobs worth.