Editor, The Auburn Plainsman
I don't understand all the fuss about Four Loko.
People have been mixing energy drinks and alcohol for probably almost a decade now, and frankly, banning Four Loko will just force college kids who drank them to mix their own alcohol and Monster or Red Bull.
And the media is taking the small increase in deaths and hospitalization because of alcohol poisoning and sensationalizing them because some (not all!) of these kids drank one Four Loko during the course of the night.
Check this out--Four Lokos are 12% alcohol by volume.
If we are drinking Monster (16 ounce can) and vodka, which let's say is 40% ABV, and we mix them, we get: one shot (1.5 ounce) -> 3% ABV two shots (3.0 ounce) -> 6.3% ABV three shots (4.5 ounce) -> 8.8% ABV four shots (6.0 ounce) -> 10.9% ABV. And so on.
If we were drinking 24 ounces of Monster, it would only take somewhere between four and five shots of 40-proof alcohol to make them equivalent to Four Loko.
In addition, Monster contains 160 milligrams of caffeine per 16-ounce can, so 240 for 24-ounce Four Loko contains (according to its website, www.drinkfour.com) the same amount of caffeine "as a tall coffee from Starbucks", which is approximately 200-250 milligrams.
A 24-ounce can of Monster would contain the same amount of caffeine as 24 ounces of Four Loko, if not a little more.
So stop banning Four Loko unless you're going to make it illegal to drink energy drinks and malt liquors together, too.
Kirstin DeRosa
sophomore,
microbiology
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