Hacker News Reader

Comment by mlyle | Hacker News Reader

> It would probably kill far more college students than alcohol poisoning does, to give some comparison.

Maybe slightly more, but not drastically so. About 15 per 100,000 college students die each year from alcohol --- poisoning, motor vehicle accidents, other alcohol-related accidents. Compare to a death rate of about 30 per 100k people aged 18-35 infected with COVID-19 (and it's much lower in the 18-24 set than the entire 18-35 group, but we don't have a good number for how much lower).

And it's not like 100% of students are going to catch it in an academic year (some have already had it, herd immunity, etc).

View on HN

I went to a college where students were required to live on campus and banned from having a car. My experience after attending multiple of these programs is that the numbers showing the dangers of drunk driving in the college age cohort are misrepresented as measuring the risk of alcohol poisoning among college students. Students were pretty much told that going to a frat party put them in mortal danger. In reality, every college student who dies of alcohol poisoning earns a local news story, and if the incidence were anything like 15 out of 100000 college students per year, the news would be full of such stories.

I worked as an RA - it was my job to enact policies addressing various risks facing the student body - and my perception is that extreme overreaction was the norm.

I sez: "About 15 per 100,000 college students die each year from alcohol --- poisoning, motor vehicle accidents, other alcohol-related "

But then you act as if I said they were all alcohol poisoning, when I was pretty explicit about the number.

Fatal alcohol poisoning (actually this is a number for unintentional poisoning in which alcohol is involved, so it's a tad broader than pure alcohol poisoning) in college is about 4 per 100,000 annually, for clarity. It is possible that the COVID-19 death rate could be lower than this in the college student cohort for 2020-2021.

> and if the incidence were anything like 15 out of 100000 college students per year, the news would be full of such stories.

Your point re: colleges with few students with cars is a good one, but survey data indicates that more college students aged 18-21 and 21-24 drive under the influence than the general population 18-21 and 21-24.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com