CHILDREN as young as 10 are having to be rushed to hospital because of booze, The Gazette can reveal.
Figures show at least 51 under-16s were admitted to the resort's hospitals for alcohol in a 12-month period.
But doctors say this is just the tip of the iceberg and there are probably far more of the youngsters ending up in need of treatment than official statistics show.
Nigel Kidner, accident and emergency consultant at Victoria Hospital, said: "The likelihood is the figure is actually higher because of the way information is recorded.
"Alcohol-related admissions can be the result of being in an accident, falls or being assaulted, so they could well be recorded as such.
"We are seeing more and more young people come in because of alcohol and some are relatively young – 10, 11, 12.
"Some have just been trying out what they have found in their parents' drink cabinets, but we see older ones, of about 14, who are chronic drinkers.
"When they are brought in, they can range from being totally unconscious, where they are completely unresponsive to even painful stimuli, down to drunk.
"They obviously have to be admitted and scanned to make sure there isn't another reason why they are unconscious.
"This is clearly a drain on resources."
And, in a chilling warning, he said: "I don't know what we can do about it really, until we get to a stage where it just isn't cool to get wasted, we don't stand a chance.
"When I first got into medicine, it was an illness of the middle-aged and elderly, but now we see people in their 20s with it."
The figures, for 2006/07, were uncovered by the Liberal Democrats in a Parliamentary question to health bosses.
Mr Kidner said the A&E department recorded 107 under 16s coming through the doors "apparently drunk" between November 2007 and October 2008, but only 14 of those were actually admitted.
Eighty-seven per cent of the youngsters were brought in by ambulance.
Seven per cent were aged 12, 15 per cent were 13, 40 per cent were 14 and 39 per cent were aged 15.
Overall in Lancashire, more than 160 children were admitted to hospital through booze during the course of one year.
Subject: Child alcohol shock in Blackpool 
Tue Nov 18, 2008 12:28 pm
