II 109th CONGRESS 1st Session S. 408 IN THE SENATE OF THE UNITED STATES February 16, 2005 Mr. DeWine (for himself, Mr. Dodd, Mr. Hagel, Mr. Warner, Mr. Corzine, Mr. Lieberman, Mr. Lautenberg, Ms. Landrieu, Mr. Jeffords, and Mr. Salazar) introduced the following bill; which was read twice and referred to the Committee on Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions A BILL To provide for programs and activities with respect to the prevention of underage drinking.

1.

Short title; table of contents

(a)

Short title

This Act may be cited as the Sober Truth on Preventing Underage Drinking Act, or the STOP Underage Drinking Act. (b)

Table of contents

The table of contents for this Act is as follows: Sec. 1. Short title; table of contents. Sec. 2. Findings. Sec. 3. Definitions. Title I—Sense of Congress Sec. 101. Sense of Congress. Title II—Interagency coordinating committee; annual report card Sec. 201. Establishment of interagency coordinating committee to prevent underage drinking. Sec. 202. Annual report card. Sec. 203. Authorization of appropriations. Title III—National media campaign Sec. 301. National media campaign to prevent underage drinking. Title IV—Interventions Sec. 401. Community-based coalition enhancement grants to prevent underage drinking. Sec. 402. Grants directed at reducing higher-education alcohol abuse. Title V—Additional research Sec. 501. Additional research on underage drinking. Sec. 502. Authorization of appropriations.

2.

Findings

The Congress finds as follows: (1) Drinking alcohol under the age of 21 is illegal in each of the 50 States and the District of Columbia. Enforcement of current laws and regulations in States and communities, such as minimum age drinking laws, zero tolerance laws, and laws and regulations which restrict availability of alcohol, must supplement other efforts to reduce underage drinking. (2) Data collected annually by the Department of Health and Human Services shows that alcohol is the most heavily used drug by children in the United States, and that— (A) more youths consume alcoholic beverages than use tobacco products or illegal drugs; (B) by the end of the eighth grade, 45.6 percent of children have engaged in alcohol use, and by the end of high school, 76.6 percent have done so; and (C) the annual societal cost of underage drinking is estimated at $53 to $58 billion. (3) Data collected by the Department of Health and Human Services and the Department of Transportation indicate that alcohol use by youth has many negative consequences, such as immediate risk from acute impairment; traffic fatalities; violence; suicide; and unprotected sex. (4) Research confirms that the harm caused by underage drinking lasts beyond the underage years. Compared to persons who wait until age 21 or older to start drinking, those who start to drink before age 14 are, as adults, four times more likely to become alcohol dependent; seven times more likely to be in a motor vehicle crash because of drinking; and more likely to suffer mental and physical damage from alcohol abuse. (5) Alcohol abuse creates long-term risk developmentally and is associated with negative physical impacts on the brain. (6) Research indicates that adults greatly underestimate the extent of alcohol use by youths, its negative consequences, and its use by their own children. The IOM report concluded that underage drinking cannot be successfully addressed by focusing on youth alone. Ultimately, adults are responsible for young people obtaining alcohol by selling, providing, or otherwise making it available to them. Parents are the most important channel of influence on their children’s underage drinking, according to the IOM report, which also recommends a national adult-oriented media campaign. (7) Research shows that public service health messages, in combination with community-based efforts, can reduce health-damaging behavior. The Department of Health and Human Services and the Ad Council have undertaken a public health campaign targeted at parents to combat underage alcohol consumption. The Ad Council estimates that, for a typical public health campaign, it receives an average of $28 million per year in free media through its 28,000 media outlets nationwide. (8) A significant percentage of the total alcohol consumption in the United States each year is by underage youth. The Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration reports that the percentage is over 11 percent. (9) Youth are exposed to a significant amount of alcohol advertising through a variety of media. Some studies indicate that youth awareness of alcohol advertising correlates to their drinking behavior and beliefs. (10) According to the Center on Alcohol Marketing and Youth, in 2002, the alcoholic beverage industry spent $927,900,000 on product advertising on television, and $24,700,000 on television advertising designed to promote the responsible use of alcohol. For every one television ad discouraging underage alcohol use, there were 215 product ads. (11) Alcohol use occurs in 76 percent of movies rated G or PG and 97 percent of movies rated PG–13. The Federal Trade Commission has recommended restricting paid alcohol beverage promotional placements to films rated R or NC–17. (12) Youth spend 9 to 11 hours per week listening to music, and 17 percent of all lyrics contain alcohol references; 30 percent of those songs include brand-name mentions. (13) Studies show that adolescents watch 20 to 27 hours of television each week, and 71 percent of prime-time television episodes depict alcohol use and 77 percent contain some reference to alcohol. (14) College and university presidents have cited alcohol abuse as the number one health problem on college and university campuses. (15) According to the National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism, two of five college students are binge drinkers; 1,400 college students die each year from alcohol-related injuries, a majority of which involve motor vehicle crashes; more than 70,000 students are victims of alcohol-related sexual assault; and 500,000 students are injured under the influence of alcohol each year. (16) According to the Center on Alcohol Marketing and Youth, in 2002, alcohol producers spent a total of $58 million to place 6,251 commercials in college sports programs, and spent $27.7 million advertising during the NCAA men’s basketball tournament, which had as many alcohol ads (939) as the Super Bowl, World Series, College Bowl Games and the National Football League’s Monday Night Football broadcasts combined (925). (17) The IOM report recommended that colleges and universities ban alcohol advertising and promotion on campus in order to demonstrate their commitment to discouraging alcohol use among underage students. (18) According to the Government Accountability Office (GAO), the Federal Government spends $1.8 billion annually to combat youth drug use and $71 million to prevent underage alcohol use. (19) The GAO concluded that there is a lack of reporting about how these funds are specifically expended, inadequate collaboration among the agencies, and no central coordinating group or office to oversee how the funds are expended or to determine the effectiveness of these efforts. (20) There are at least three major, annual, government funded national surveys in the United States that include underage drinking data: the National Household Survey on Drug Use and Health, Monitoring the Future, and the Youth Risk Behavior Survey. These surveys do not use common indicators to allow for direct comparison of youth alcohol consumption patterns. Analyses of recent years’ data do, however, show similar results. (21) Research shows that school-based and community-based interventions can reduce underage drinking and associated problems, and that positive outcomes can be achieved by combining environmental and institutional change with theory-based health education—a comprehensive, community-based approach. (22) Studies show that a minority of youth who need treatment for their alcohol problems receive such services. Further, insufficient information exists to properly assist clinicians and other providers in their youth treatment efforts.

3.

Definitions

For purposes of this Act: (1) The term binge drinking means a pattern of drinking alcohol that brings blood alcohol concentration (BAC) to 0.08 gm percent or above. For the typical adult, this pattern corresponds to consuming 5 or more drinks (male), or 4 or more drinks (female), in about 2 hours. (2) The term heavy drinking means five or more drinks on the same occasion in the past 30 days. (3) The term frequent heavy drinking means five or more drinks on at least five occasions in the last 30 days. (4) The term alcoholic beverage industry means the brewers, vintners, distillers, importers, distributors, and retail outlets that sell and serve beer, wine, and distilled spirits. (5) The term school-based prevention means programs, which are institutionalized, and run by staff members or school-designated persons or organizations in every grade of school, kindergarten through 12th grade. (6) The term youth means persons under the age of 21. (7) The term IOM report means the report released in September 2003 by the National Research Council, Institute of Medicine, and entitled Reducing Underage Drinking: A Collective Responsibility.