ABSTRACT
The first part of this paper consists of an international review of the world literature on the effects on children and adolescents of excessive drinking by their parents. The second part describes a proposed WHO initiative, stimulated by the conclusions of the international reviw of the literature. The proposal is for a multicenter, multinational study designed to identify, understand and strengthen natural family coping methods for dealing with alcohol and drug abuse so that these can be applied in primary health care settings.
