Sir, - The sudden proliferation of alcoholic lemonades on the market is, I believe, a direct response by the breweries to the threat posed to them by the widespread availability of illegal drugs. Since the late 1980s, a significantly large number of young people have been choosing to smoke cannabis and take ecstasy at the weekends, rather than consume large quantities of ethyl alcohol.
The rise of a generation that preferred using psychoactive drugs to intoxicating themselves with alcohol must have seriously worried an industry that relies heavily on young drinkers to sustain its profits. Thus their introduction of a range of sweet tasting and brightly packaged alcoholic products designed to get them even younger.
In 10,000 years of recorded use, nobody has ever died as a direct result of smoking cannabis. And despite much media hysteria over ecstasy related deaths, the fact remains that relatively few users die on the drug. Alcohol is directly responsible for thousands of deaths in Ireland every year, either through heart or liver disease or through the inability of many of its users to handle the drug properly (road deaths etc.). Given all of this, one can't but wonder if the chemical generation hasn't made a more sensible choice than many of its predecessors. - Yours, etc.,
Lr Harold's Cross Road,
Dublin 6W.