Fewer young people with alcohol poisoning in hospital
In North Rhine-Westphalia, fewer children and adolescents were treated in hospital for acute alcohol poisoning last year than in 2021. 2355 young people between the ages of ten and 19 were admitted to hospital for alcohol-related behavioral disorders - 5.5 percent fewer than in the previous year, the state statistics office IT.NRW reported on Thursday. Almost half of the adolescents - 1,135 people - were female. If you look at the particularly young people affected, there were 349 children between the ages of ten and 14.
According to IT.NRW, the downward trend observed since 2017 thus continued. In 2020, when the restrictions due to the coronavirus pandemic began, the number of children and adolescents treated as inpatients for alcohol-related behavioral disorders fell particularly sharply by 38.7% compared to 2019.
The decline in alcohol-related treatment cases for young people in NRW in 2022 was slightly greater for boys and young men than for their female peers: The decrease was 5.9% for young males and 5.0% for young females.
The ten to 19-year-old patients made up 0.14% of their entire age group on a national average. Regionally, the proportion was highest in the district of Soest at 0.30%, followed by the district of Coesfeld (0.23%) and the city of Bonn (0.21%). The statisticians determined the lowest rates for Leverkusen, the Rhine district of Neuss and Cologne with 0.06% each.
The decrease in alcohol-related hospitalizations among youth in North Rhine-Westphalia may be linked to a growing awareness of health consequences associated with alcohol abuse. Encouragingly, this trend indicates a potential reduction in alcohol-related issues among the younger population.
Source: www.dpa.com
