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Sunday, July 27, 2025

Enforcement key to age-limit increases

by

15 days ago
20250712

Quite pre­dictably, Prime Min­is­ter Kam­la Per­sad-Bisses­sar re­cent­ly an­nounced a plan to raise the le­gal age for al­co­hol con­sump­tion from 18 to 21 and to set a high­er age thresh­old for the use of mar­i­jua­na has sparked a cho­rus of dif­fer­ing opin­ions.

For decades, al­co­hol has been as much a part of T&T’s cul­tur­al DNA as mu­sic, food, and Car­ni­val. A drink in hand is com­mon­place at fam­i­ly gath­er­ings, so­cial events, or a lime with friends. Mar­i­jua­na too—once taboo and heav­i­ly crim­i­nalised—is now un­der­go­ing its own trans­for­ma­tion as at­ti­tudes and laws evolve re­gion­al­ly and world­wide.

How­ev­er, there is a com­pelling sci­en­tif­ic con­sen­sus that the brain con­tin­ues to de­vel­op well in­to a per­son’s mid-20s and that the parts re­spon­si­ble for im­pulse con­trol, judge­ment, and de­ci­sion-mak­ing are among the last to ma­ture. There­fore, in­tro­duc­ing sub­stances such as al­co­hol or cannabis dur­ing these crit­i­cal years in­creas­es the risk of ad­dic­tion, men­tal health dis­or­ders, and cog­ni­tive im­pair­ment.

More­over, T&T al­ready bat­tles sig­nif­i­cant so­cial costs from al­co­hol mis­use—trau­ma cas­es, do­mes­tic vi­o­lence in­ci­dents, al­co­hol-re­lat­ed ill­ness­es, and road fa­tal­i­ties.

These are not ab­stract con­cerns—they are lived re­al­i­ties af­fect­ing fam­i­lies, com­mu­ni­ties, and the econ­o­my.

And while the con­ver­sa­tion is shift­ing to­wards le­gal­i­sa­tion or de­crim­i­nal­i­sa­tion of mar­i­jua­na, that does not mean it is harm­less, par­tic­u­lar­ly for younger users. Stud­ies link fre­quent ado­les­cent cannabis use with mem­o­ry is­sues, re­duced ed­u­ca­tion­al at­tain­ment, and height­ened risk of psy­chi­atric dis­or­ders.

In any case, if T&T even­tu­al­ly cre­ates a reg­u­lat­ed cannabis mar­ket, it makes sense to im­ple­ment an age lim­it.

Coun­tries that raised drink­ing ages, such as the Unit­ed States, which moved from 18 to 21 in the 1980s, saw de­clines in al­co­hol con­sump­tion among youth, few­er drunk-dri­ving deaths, and de­layed ini­ti­a­tion in­to drink­ing.

Even if some young peo­ple in­evitably cir­cum­vent the law, high­er age lim­its tend to low­er over­all rates of heavy use and de­pen­den­cy.

How­ev­er, leg­is­la­tion alone can­not solve this is­sue. En­force­ment has al­ways been a chal­lenge in this coun­try. Age lim­its mean lit­tle if bar­tenders, ven­dors, or event pro­mot­ers fail to check IDs or turn a blind eye for prof­it. The same goes for mar­i­jua­na, where an il­lic­it mar­ket may per­sist even if le­gal­i­sa­tion oc­curs.

Chang­ing laws al­so means con­fronting re­sis­tance.

Many will ar­gue that if some­one is old enough to vote or mar­ry, they should be trust­ed to drink or smoke. That is a valid point, and any pol­i­cy shift must be ac­com­pa­nied by pub­lic ed­u­ca­tion cam­paigns to ex­plain the sci­en­tif­ic ra­tio­nale and po­ten­tial ben­e­fits.

Eco­nom­i­cal­ly, the al­co­hol and (po­ten­tial) cannabis in­dus­tries are sig­nif­i­cant. Bars, restau­rants, event pro­mot­ers, and small busi­ness­es could push back, fear­ing rev­enue loss­es if the le­gal ages rise. There’s al­so a risk of dri­ving un­der­age con­sump­tion fur­ther un­der­ground.

There­fore, poli­cies must be paired with com­mu­ni­ty sup­port, men­tal health ser­vices, and oth­er harm-re­duc­tion strate­gies.

The big­ger pic­ture is clear. Any de­ci­sion on rais­ing the age lim­its for con­sump­tion of al­co­hol and smok­ing mar­i­jua­na should be about in­vest­ing in the health, pro­duc­tiv­i­ty, and fu­ture of T&T. The de­ci­sion should be based not on po­lit­i­cal agen­das, but on coura­geous, sci­ence-dri­ven pol­i­cy­mak­ing that pri­ori­tis­es peo­ple’s needs.

Rais­ing the le­gal age should not be about pro­hi­bi­tion but about pro­tec­tion.


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