Alcohol and Growth

[Red X]

Could drinking alcohol during adolecense retard that persons growth?

 

...my friend wanted to know :)

[infamous]

Could drinking alcohol during adolecense retard that persons growth?

 

...my friend wanted to know :)

Welcome to Hypography Red X; About your question concerning the use of alcohol. I've never seen any data on the subject pertaining to physical growth but it's common knowledge that the exaggerated consumption of spirits will have a detrimental effect on brain cells. As a youth it seems that all of us, at one time or another, are told that coffee, cigarettes, and booz will stunt our growth. Whether this is true or not is an interesting question. If you find any good scientific information on the subject, please inform the rest of us, I'm sure many of us would like to know the answer to that one.

[insight]

Could drinking alcohol during adolecense retard that persons growth?

 

...my friend wanted to know :)

 

I drank in my teen age and has drunk till now :eek:

[Red X]

Well, I did a google search on it and some sites said it did while others said it was a myth from a christian association. I looked at sites such as these TeenHealthFX and this according to Dr. Wes

"Dear Dr. Wes: Can drinking at a young age stunt your growth or affect you for the rest of your life? Does alcohol affect development during puberty?

 

Yes. Excessive drinking prevents the formation of the sex steroids that are required for growth and maturation. "

 

from http://www.whatsdrivingyou.org/resources/ask_experts/alcohol_and_body.html

 

I wish they would have a little more reasoning behind what they say.

[CraigD]

Well, I did a google search on it and some sites said it did while others said it was a myth from a christian association. I looked at sites such as these TeenHealthFX and this according to Dr. Wes

"Dear Dr. Wes: Can drinking at a young age stunt your growth or affect you for the rest of your life? Does alcohol affect development during puberty?

 

Yes. Excessive drinking prevents the formation of the sex steroids that are required for growth and maturation. "

Excessive drinking can kill you, or so badly damage your liver that you require a transplant before your 25th birthday. It isn’t too much of a stretch to call these consequences “growth stunting.”

 

Another problem with drinking is that while alcoholic beverages contain quite a bit of food energy (calories), they’re “junk”, deficient in many proteins, vitamins, and minerals, so even if you don’t drink enough to get organ damage, you may suffer malnutrition due to poor diet. Malnutrition can certainly stunt your growth.

 

I know of no evidence that moderate drinking is injurious to even very young people. In many cultures with poor water purity, dilute alcohol consumption is so widespread that infants are imbibing from birth – alcohol passes readily into mothers milk. Provided they have otherwise good quality food, these cultures don’t seem to have an unusual incidence of stunted growth.