The consequences of college drinking are more dangerous than commonly realized, according to a new study supported by the National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism.

The study says drinking alcohol results in 1,400 deaths, 500,000 injuries, and 70,000 cases of sexual assault or date rape each year for college students ages 18-24.

The study comes in the wake of Madison city and campus concerns over alcohol policies, which many think endanger the health of students.

“The harm that college students do to themselves and others as a result of excessive drinking exceeds what many would have expected,” said primary author Ralph W. Hingson, SC.D, a professor of social behavioral sciences and associate dean for research at Boston University School of Public Health. “Our data clearly point to the need for better interventions against high-risk drinking in this population.”

The study’s authors derived their data by integrating a number of national databases containing information about drinking and its consequences. The study is published in the March, 2002 issue of the Journal of Studies on Alcohol.

“These numbers paint a picture of a deeply entrenched threat to the health and well-being of our young people,” said Raynard S. Kington, M.D., Ph.D., acting director of NIAAA.

The study also determined the trend of binge-drinking on college campuses, found to be rising. About 40 percent of students binge-drink, defined as five or more drinks in a row for men and four or more drinks in a row for women, the standard established by the Harvard School of Public Health. Reports showed about 20 percent of students said they binged more than three times in the last two weeks. This group of frequent binge-drinkers accounts for nearly 70 percent of all alcohol consumed by college students.

UW students binge-drink significantly more, according to a survey by the Harvard School of Public Health’s most recent study. It found 66 percent of students here consume excessive alcohol.

The NIAAA Task Force on College Drinking studied research on alcohol prevention among college students to determine the productivity of prevention programs. Task Force co-chair Mark Goldman, Ph.D., distinguished research professor of psychology at the University of South Florida, said they found prevention research to be incomplete.

“The evidence supporting the alcohol abuse prevention strategies in the literature varies widely, often reflecting the fact that some strategies have not been as thoroughly studied as others or have not been evaluated in college settings,” Dr. Goldman said.

However, they did find a number of clear factors interact to produce various drinking patterns. Genetic and biological characteristics, family and cultural backgrounds, and particular college environments were among those factors.

The Task Force developed a framework to help colleges and universities design prevention programs that target these constituencies and designed a four-tier system to rank the strength of the strategies:

-Effective and targeted at College Students. Example: Altering students’ expectations about the effects of alcohol.

-Effective With General Populations and Could Be Applied to College Environments. Examples: Formation of campus and community coalitions; enforcement of minimum drinking-age laws.

-Promising. Examples: Reinstate Friday classes and exams and Saturday morning classes; “Safe-Ride” programs.

-Ineffective. Example: Interventions that rely entirely on providing information about problems related to risks from drinking.

Susan Crowley, University Health Services director of prevention services, recently told the Badger Herald prevention will come from a variety of sources.

“There’s no magic bullet; an effective response will include education, a variety of options instead of drinking, and policy change,” she said.

The study also estimated that more than one-fourth of college students have driven in the past year while under the influence of alcohol.

One anonymous UW student admitted he has driven while intoxicated.

“I haven’t hurt anyone,” he said. “It’s not something I like to do, but I probably won’t stop.”