The past decade has seen a doubling of alcohol poisoning and a two-thirds increase in the symptoms of chronic alcoholism. Parasuicides now number 11,000 in the Republic annually, many among young teen drinkers. Unintentional suicide - where teens pass out, inhale their own vomit and die - are rare, but long-term mental consequences are both more subtle and more widespread.

The Government last week launched a programme to curtail our high suicide rate, but most teens and parents are unaware that binge-drinking can directly cause depression, anxiety, suicide and attempted suicide in otherwise mentally stable young people, warns Dr Conor Farren, consultant child and adolescent psychiatrist. "A plummet into profound depression can occur up to four days after a binge. Research on young male suicides has found that 93 per cent had taken alcohol and 58 per cent were significantly over the legal limit," he explains.

During the period 1989-2001, while alcohol intake rose by 49 per cent the suicide rate among young men increased fourfold. The link between alcohol and suicide may explain why many parents of suicides will say their child seemed happy and well-adjusted beforehand. "In many cases this was true, and it was the alcohol that did it," says Dr Farren.

"The effect on the developing brain is significant," says Marian Rackhard, chairwoman of Alcohol Action Alliance and an addiction counsellor with 20 years' experience. "I have seen throughout my career people who drank heavily in their teens and developed a problem quicker than those who started at 20. People have a lot of catching up to do because they missed out on the normal stages of development in their teens, something they only recognise in hindsight. It's hard to put this message to the young, that you will feel the consequences in your 20s and 30s, when the drinks industry is putting out competing messages that drinking makes you more attractive and successful. The health issue is of no interest to teens. They need to be educated."

She believes teens who turn up in A&E departments with alcohol poisoning should be placed in intervention programmes that educate them about their drinking.

Dr Bobby Smyth, a consultant child and adolescent psychiatrist, believes that with targeted education programmes, teens can be helped to stop drinking until they are older, or to at least moderate their drinking.

Farren agrees, adding: "The Government focus has been on illegal drugs, but there is an enormous need for alcohol services and intervention for teens, which exists pocket-like in only a few places. We should have, for example, specially trained nurses offering immediate intervention for teens who arrive in A&E with alcohol poisoning."