As most of us know there are very few things in life as warming, as enriching, as sharing a few convivial drinks with the people we love.
This is especially so at holiday time — this time of the year.
Equally, we are all only too well aware of the terrible consequences of regular alcohol abuse. Nearly every family or business in this country has watched with something beyond despair as an individual, a relative or a colleague, surrenders their independence, career, quality of life, relationships and health to alcohol addiction. This pain is especially sharp in communities where alcohol misuse has been a factor in suicide or drink-related road deaths — more or less every community in the country.
Though the focus is often on public drunkenness, the tens of thousands of men and women who drink quietly and excessively at home, to alleviate loneliness or plain boredom, are far more susceptible to alcoholism than weekend binge drinkers.
We are also aware of the cant, sanctimony and hypocrisy that surrounds advocacy on alcohol in a society where it is more or less the social lingua franca, the primary lubricant of so very much that is warming in our lives. The great challenge, especially at a time like Christmas and the New Year, is to strike a balance between good fun, excess and self-destruction.
It is a national tragedy, and we are not by any means alone in this, that we have not always successfully navigated our way through this particular minefield. The figures around alcohol abuse are so very stark that they cannot be ignored.
Alcohol causes nearly 100 — 88 — deaths every month in Ireland. Cheap alcohol is fuelling an escalating health and crime crisis that costs an estimated €3.7bn a year in health, crime, public order and other costs.
Source: Irish Examiner, 17/12/13
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