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What Are the Dangers of Beer Funnels?

A beer funnel, sometimes referred to as a beer bong, is a simple contraption, either built by hand or purchased at a specialty store or website. It consists of a funnel connected to a long hose. The concept is to pour beer into the funnel and the person at the end of the hose consumes the alcohol as quickly as possible. The purpose of using a beer funnel is recreational--but for some, this activity is anything but entertainment. Beer funnels are primarily a plaything used by teens and young adults--people with very little knowledge of the dangers of alcohol.

  1. Short-Term Health Consequences

    • An alcohol and drug education center in Australia warns that beer funnels only encourage dangerous and irresponsible behavior. The sole purpose of using this contraption is to drink quickly, and consume as much alcohol as possible. Injecting alcohol into the system so rapidly raises the risk of developing alcohol poisoning, which, the Western Region Alcohol and Drug Centre (WRAD) suggests, “can result in blackouts, seizures and hypothermia. People in these cases can pass out, choke on their own vomit and potentially die.”

    Long-Term Health Risks

    • WRAD also warns that alcohol abuse can lead to “long-term damage to the heart, liver and brain.” Teen Alcohol Abuse, an educational website, suggests that beer bongs, known as a capacity game, pose additional problems for young people: this form of social drinking encourages alcohol abuse, promotes heavy drinking, leads young people to believe that socializing can only be enjoyed when they’re getting drunk and may lead to a potentially chronic and progressive alcohol problem.

    Legal Consequences

    • Eye On Students, a higher-education newsletter, reports that drinking games, like playing beer bong, make young people believe that drinking in excess is normal. This type of drinking also lends itself to overconsumption since it’s difficult to keep track of how many beers have been ingested. If a person is not aware of how intoxicated they are, they’re more likely to engage in dangerous behaviors like driving while drunk. Not only does drinking under the influence pose a risk for arrest and jail, but the person may be thrown out of school or fired from a job if they’re underage.

    The Ultimate Cost of Binge Drinking

    • In an Associated Press investigation, reported in an article on ABC.com, between 1999 and 2005, 157 Americans between the ages of 18 and 23 drank themselves to death. The National Institutes of Health reports that about 600,000 college students incur alcohol-related injuries each year, while about 1,700 die of alcohol-related causes. Because the only purpose of a beer funnel is to deliver alcohol to the system more rapidly, it’s easy to see how playing this supposedly innocent drinking game could have potentially grave consequences.

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