Binge Drinking Leads to Unsafe Sex
Reported September 05, 2008
ORLANDO, Fla. (Ivanhoe Newswire) — According to the Centers for Disease Control, 75 percent of alcohol consumed in the United States is in the form of binge drinks — and that staggering figure is contributing to unsafe sex and STDs among women, according to a new study.
Results of the study show binge drinking, or drinking five or more alcoholic beverages at a time, puts women at a substantially greater risk for engaging in unsafe sexual practices and contracting gonorrhea.
Researchers found women binge drinkers are three times more likely to have anal sex, twice as likely to have multiple sexual partners and five times more likely to have gonorrhea as women who dont drink alcohol.
“In this case we have the irrefutable evidence of the STDs, which are the biomarker to show yes, in fact, if you binge drink, you’re at a higher risk for an STD,” Heidi Hutton, Ph.D., assistant professor of psychiatry and behavioral sciences at Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine and corresponding author of the study, told Ivanhoe.
Since men have a higher rate of STDs across the board, results were significant only in women, Dr. Hutton explained. She said women can take action against the phenomenon by limiting the amount of alcohol they drink and having protected sex.
“I think that the negative consequences for women that come from risky sex and risky drinking are higher than they are for men,” Dr. Hutton said.
SOURCE: Ivanhoe interview with Heidi Hutton, Ph.D.; Alcoholism: Clinical & Experimental Research, 2008, published online September 5, 2008
