While thousands of college students go out every single night to celebrate a birthday, the end of an exam or just to get out of the house, many of these college students bring home a lot more than just a fun night out at the bars. While some students know how to drink responsibly, for the majority of students consuming alcohol, the way in which they handle their liquor is scary and far more dangerous than one might think. While drinking too much alcohol, whether it is on a single occasion or over time, the damages it has on the body can take a serious if not fatal toll on a person’s health. While many students, including the students here at UCF, are consuming an unhealthy amount of beer and liquor into their bodies on a regular basis, there are both short term and long term effects that plays a serious health issue to a person’s body.
When it comes to short-term effects, the consumption of too much alcohol can cause what just about every college student has had and that is the hangover. And while a hangover or a bad night’s sleep can be not so fun for a couple of days while recovering from drinking too much liquor, it is the longer term health effects of alcohol that people often experience once it’s too late.
To help give a better understanding of how serious the health effects of consuming alcohol are, here is a list of both the short term and long term effects:
Short term effects: Hangovers can leave a person tired, sluggish and stressed from all the drinking the night before. From a disturbed night’s sleep to alcohol poisoning, alcohol’s effects on the body can have a varying impact on our lives.
Long-term effects: Consuming alcohol for a long period of time can cause not only stress to the body, but it can also cause cancer, diabetes, liver failure and many other harmful side effects.
Alcohol not only interferes with the entire bodies functions, but it interferes with the brain’s communication pathways, and can affect the way the brain looks and works. These disruptions can change mood and behavior, and make it harder to think clearly and move with coordination. Alcohol affects the heart, the liver, the pancreas, the immune system and causing cancer. By drinking too much over a long period of time, alcohol can cause cardiomyopathy, arrhythmias, a stroke, or high blood pressure. When it comes to the effects of alcohol, the liver can seriously be damaged. Heavy drinking takes a toll on the liver, and can lead to a variety of problems and liver inflammations. Drinking too much cannot only weaken your immune system, but it also can make your body a much easier target for disease.
So next time you decide to go out, celebrate and drink it up, remember all the effects alcohol can have on the body before consuming too much!