NEW YORK (Reuters Health) - Teenage drinking has been linked to alcohol dependency later life and to more immediate risks such as car accidents. Now, new research shows that people who start drinking early on may take more risks and collect more injuries throughout their lives.

In a study of nearly 43,000 adults, investigators found that those who had started drinking by age 14 were far more likely than others to suffer an alcohol-related injury at some point in their lives. Drunken accidents were three times more common among these drinkers than among those who took up drinking at age 21, researchers report in the September 27th issue of The Journal of the American Medical Association (news - web sites).

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