Out Of Their Minds

In the same month in which an official survey confirmed what our eyes have long since told us - that Irish teenagers, like their elders, regularly abuse alcohol - it is sobering, to say the least, to check out the alcohol awareness website run by the Health Promotion Unit.
Minister Michael Martin may insist that "we must stop kidding ourselves" about the scale of the problem but his words would carry a lot more weight if his own department didn't support initiatives which, frankly, look like they're taking the piss out of their target audience.
The accompanying comic strip images are taken from coolchoices.com, appear under the cringe-inducing title "d'real world" and purport to show us the"possible consequences" of alcohol abuse on a group of students "all aged 18".
Sadly, this is not an exercise in knowing, post-modern irony; it is simply as daft, dated and dumb as it looks.
According to a World Health Organisation survey released last week, some 55,000 European teens died as a result of alcohol abuse in 1999. The same survey also underlined that Irish teens are among the worst binge drinkers in Europe.
Against that backdrop, the embarrassing saga of Nuala and her pals begs a question of the Minister: just who's kidding who?