Solomon noted that comparable rates of alcohol use do not necessarily result in comparable rates of alcohol-related health problems. Muramoto said. About the University of Arizona Health Sciences The University of Arizona Health Sciences is the statewide leader in biomedical research and health professions training.
From these vantage points, the UA Health Sciences reaches across the state of Arizona and the greater Southwest to provide cutting-edge health education, research, patient care and community outreach services. Skip to main content. This analysis revealed that Native Americans are four times more likely to die from alcohol-related illnesses or accidents compared to the general population across North America.
This included road accidents caused by alcohol consumption and alcohol-inflicted illnesses such as liver disease. Native Americans are also more likely to experience non-fatal injuries and ailments as a result of their alcohol consumption.
This includes muscle strains, sprains, visual and hearing problems, head injuries, bladder and kidney problems and poor dental health.
Native American babies are seven times more at risk of developing FAS compared to the national average. Native Americans are also much more at risk of abusing alcohol during their youth compared to the general population. During this period, Native Americans predominately produced alcohol for ceremonial purposes. The Apache, Maricopa and Pagago tribes produced wine from the saguaro cactus.
In Texas, the Coahuiltecan tribe created alcoholic beverages by mixing agave plants with laurel. In the Eastern region of the United States, the Cherokee tribe produced alcoholic beverages by combining berries and fruits.
Native Americans living in North America were unable to produce stronger alcohol concentrations during this period simply because advanced distillation techniques had not yet been discovered. This contrasted with Mexican Native Americans who were able to distil alcohol at over forty per cent from pineapple, honey or wild plum. Europeans had developed advanced distilling techniques during the centuries prior to colonisation of North America. These alcohol-distilling techniques were developed over a long period of time, thus giving European populations the ability to develop legal, moral and social guidelines to moderate their use of this powerful drug.
When Europeans colonised North America, vast quantities of strong alcoholic beverages became available to Native Americans without giving them an opportunity to develop social and moral guidelines to moderate their use. Europeans utilised potent spirits and wines as a means of trading with Native Americans.
Distilled spirits were exchanged for animal skins and other precious resources. This created much demand for potent alcoholic-beverages amongst Native American tribes. Europeans discovered they could strengthen their hand in trade deals by intoxicating Native Americans with alcohol during negotiations. Europeans also drank during negotiations, but these people had, unlike their Native American counterparts, built up a tolerance to these potent spirits and wines.
This trend continued as the land was colonised from East to West. Miners, trappers and lumbermen all utilised alcohol as a means of weakening Native Americans ability to resist efforts to either steal or profit from their lands.
Most Native Americans only drank during trading negotiations or social events where Europeans were present. Since , alcohol consumption has remained constant amongst the Native American population. This creates a vicious cycle: addiction itself becomes a reason for even more rejection, prejudice, and maltreatment. Perhaps nowhere is this clearer than in the shameful collection of stereotypes and stigmas surrounding alcoholism among American Indians.
Jefferson argues that whites have only "sold what individuals wish to buy" and that "spirituous liquors are not in themselves bad … But as you find that your people cannot refrain from an ill use of them, I greatly applaud your resolution not to use them at all.
The apogee of victim-blaming, the idea that genetic "inferiority" causes native peoples to be particularly susceptible to addiction was not falsifiable when it was initially spread. But even now that it has been disproven, the myth obscures the real causes of addiction and the starring roles that trauma and the multiple stresses of inequality can play in creating it.
There is no evidence that Native Americans are more biologically susceptible to substance use disorders than any other group Rates of all types of addiction — not just alcohol — are elevated in aboriginal peoples around the world, not only in America. But what they clearly do have in common is an ongoing multi-generational experience of trauma. The link between trauma and addiction is not in dispute — and the earlier the trauma, the worse the risk of addiction becomes.
For example, one study of nearly 10, people found that those with four or more of these types of "adverse childhood experiences" ACEs have a risk of alcoholism that is seven times greater than those with none. Similarly, boys who have four or more ACEs are nearly five times more likely to inject drugs than those with none. A quarter of Native Americans were separated from their parents, and often, their tribe early in life American Indians are also much more likely than whites to have their families broken up by the state, which can propel trauma down the generations.
Among older Indians, thousands were torn away from their parents and sent to abusive boarding schools whose explicit goal was cultural genocide: "Kill the Indian to save the man. Today, a full quarter of Native Americans either have personal boarding school experience or were adopted by whites — meaning they were separated from their parents and, often, from their tribe early in life, according to Elm.
Take, for instance, the historical case of one island tribe in Canada, cited by psychologist Bruce Alexander, the author of The Globalization of Addiction. Its geographical isolation actually allowed successful prohibition. Alexander is best known for his research showing that an enriched social and physical environment for rats " Rat Park " dramatically reduced their risk of becoming addicted to morphine. When rats were kept in bare cages — the rodent equivalent of a life of solitary confinement — they readily lapped up solutions that contained morphine.
But when they had toys, companions, mates, and room to run, even if they were first made physically dependent and taught that the drink would relieve withdrawal symptoms, they took far less than the isolated, caged rats did. Other rat research also shows that social stress — like being beaten in a fight by a dominant rat — doubles addiction risk for the defeated animal. In humans, low socioeconomic status raises addiction risk even further.
Not only do the misconceptions spring from bigoted historical tropes. They also, as May suggests, stem from flawed research and misconstrued results.
The most controversial is the biological determinist position that alcoholism is genetic. May argues that this is based solely on one study that reported that Indians metabolize alcohol more slowly than non-Indians, a study that was later criticized as highly flawed.
As May writes:. Major reviews of alcohol metabolism among all ethnic groups usually conclude that alcohol metabolism and alcohol genetics are traits of individuals and that there is more variation within an ethnic group than there is between ethnic groups. Further, when biophysiologic investigators attempt to explain major alcohol-related behaviors, they generally point to sociocultural variables as the major factors.
Researchers do seek to understand things like the disproportionately high rates of alcohol-related deaths among the American Indian population.
An oft-cited study by the Indian Health Service in the mids, for instance, determined that, on average, Indians die more frequently of alcohol-related causes than non-Indians.
Indian deaths in alcohol-related car and other accidents were found to be three to four times higher than non-Natives; Indian suicide was found to be one and a half to two times higher; Indian deaths due to homicide were found to be roughly two times higher; and Indian deaths due to alcoholism were found to be five and a half to seven and a half times higher.
These realities can be explained, May says, in three ways. First, the differences can be accounted for by demographic, social, and political differences experienced by American Indians. Demographically, the American Indian population is relatively young in the median age was Sociopolitical considerations such as low socioeconomic status also exacerbate alcohol-related problems.
Second, American Indian drinking styles tend to be more flamboyant, characterized by abusive drinking such as binge drinking and high blood alcohol levels. Third, the mixing of alcohol impairment with risky behaviors and risky environments further contributes to higher mortality rates.
Most Indian people still live in rural Western states where higher death rates can also be expected due to higher-risk environments, greater distances from care facilities, and lack of availability of services.
It should be emphasized that, while we can think of many of these factors as behavioral, none of them automatically indicate defined patterns of addictive drinking.
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