Irish teenage girls have the second
highest rate of binge drinking in the developed world, second only to
those in the US, and the weakening of the traditional family is
partly to blame, according to a new report.

The report, Health of the World’s
Adolescents, published in the medical journal The Lancet showed that
30pc of US teen girls aged 13-15 had been engaged in binge drinking
in the past 30 days. For Irish teens in the same age bracket, the
comparable rate was 29pc, higher than any other European countries
for which data was available.

And the report said that digital media,
industrialisation, globalisation and urbanisation have changed
traditional family and community influences, resulting in less
‘social scaffolding’ of adolescents, according to a report in the
Daily Mail.

Overall, the report showed that
teenagers that adolescents were at great risk from binge drinking,
drug taking and sexually transmitted diseases .

The report showed that Britain had the
third highest proportion of sexually active teenagers in the world as
well as some of the worst levels of harmful underage drinking. The
research found that sexual activity among 13 to 15-year-olds was
highest among girls in Denmark followed by Iceland, the UK and
Sweden.

Greece and Denmark had the highest
rates among boys. The lowest rates in boys were in Belgium, and for
girls Israel.

And while the report did not have data
on binge drinking for teenage girls within the past 30 days, it
showed that England had the fourth highest percentage of youngsters
who have been drunk by the age of 13 in a league table of 40 mostly
high income countries. Wales was fifth and Scotland eighth.

The figures are taken from 2006, the
last year with internationally comparable data, and tthey suggest
that teenagers’ general well being has improved far less over the
last 50 years than that of children under 10 with evidence suggesting
adolescence is not the healthiest time of life.

While the death rate among under fives
has declined by 80 per cent or more in many countries in the past
fifty years, adolescent mortality has only marginally improved.

Studies on adolescent brains suggest
they are more affected than adults by exciting or stressful
situations when making decisions. Increased activity in the nucleus
accumbens, a reward and pleasure centre, appears linked to this.

The researchers said with longer
periods in education, and significant delays to marriage or settling
down, the period during which young people are exposed to the risks
of adolescence has extended significantly.

Such behaviours include harmful alcohol
consumption and illicit drug use with peers, and sex with more casual
partners, increasing the risk of sexually transmitted infections.