Taskforce to Provide Underage Drinking Awareness

The Cobb Alcohol Taskforce will be one of 25 venues at the free community health fair Saturday at

The taskforce will present facts about underage drinking’s impact on brain development, information about social host/teen party ordinances and the Cobb Safe Neighborhoods Safe Homes – a campaign that asks Cobb County residents to agree to six common sense safety steps to help adults keep youth safe by reducing their access to alcohol.

Youth use alcohol four times more than all other drugs combined. Alcohol is involved in the top three causes of death for people under 21: homicide, suicide and accidental injury. Private home parties are the primary source by which youth obtain alcohol. Research shows that private home parties frequently lack adult supervision, are the source for other drug use, risky sexual behaviors, violence and vandalism.

61 percent of Cobb 10th and 12th graders participating in the 2009 Georgia Student Health Survey (see attached pdf) said that they use alcohol at a friends’ house.

The Cobb Alcohol Taskforce is participating in the health fair to give adults the tools to fight underage drinking where it is most prevalent–the home.

The taskforce is an alliance of individuals and organizations, which challenge adults to reduce underage drinking and youth binge drinking, by advancing strategic enforcement, policy and education goals.

Visit the health fair Saturday from 10 a.m. - 3 p.m. is located at 1815 Blackwell Rd. in Northeast Cobb.

For more information about the taskforce, call 770-861-5758.