Editor's note: Henry Wechsler, a lecturer on social psychology at the School of Public Health and an authority on binge drinking, offered the following testimony before the Boston City Council's Committee on Public Safety and University and Community Relations on Oct. 9. The public hearing drew students, law enforcement officers, and university representatives who addressed alcohol use and abuse on college campuses.

We are all saddened and outraged by the tragic death of a young man just starting to fulfill his life promise. Last week's death from an alcohol overdose of Scott Krueger, a freshman at M.I.T., is an unfortunate consequence of a style of drinking that is deeply entrenched and widespread at American colleges. It is probably more threatening in New England and, in particular, the Boston area than anywhere else in the country because we are the hub of college life in the U.S. Binge drinking is a reality of college life, and perhaps the central focus of fraternity-house life. When uncontrolled drinking like this occurs, catastrophe is waiting to happen.

But it is not inevitable. It can be prevented by college officials and local authorities acting in concert to curb underage binge drinking. The tragedy at M.I.T. has aroused national attention. The fact that such a needless death occurred at this academically elite school has dramatically demonstrated that it can happen anywhere at any time. But we in Boston must take special notice. Our state attracts more than 400,000 students to 118 colleges, 32 of which are located in Boston. Parents in the nation entrust our city and state with their children and expect us to provide them with a safe environment in which to grow and learn.

When we released the findings of the Harvard School of Public Health College Alcohol Study almost three years ago, we described a major national problem. In our study of 140 colleges in 40 states, we found that almost half (44 percent) of college students were binge drinkers and that one in five (19 percent) did so more than once a week. Much of the binge drinking was centered around fraternity and sorority life. Seven of eight (86 percent) fraternity house residents were binge drinkers.

Binge drinkers hurt themselves, and others, too. They hurt themselves through injuries, fights, trouble with police, unsafe sexual behavior, broken personal relationships, and missed educational opportunities. They hurt others on campus through the secondhand effects of binge drinking: assaults, unwanted sexual advances and acquaintance rape, vandalism, interruptions of sleep and study, and of course, drunk driving.

College binge drinking is not a secret. You can hear it. You can smell it. You can learn all you need to know about it by taking a quick ride, as I have, in a campus police van on a Thursday, Friday, or Saturday night. A college security officer can tell you where the binge drinking takes place and which students, fraternities, and alcohol outlets are violating college rules or local ordinances. He will also tell you that, in many cases, the campus police feel powerless to interfere.

A freshman learns during the first week of school where the alcohol and parties are, and often has a binge drinking experience even before buying a textbook. The heaviest drinking most likely takes place at parties in certain fraternity houses and housing complexes just off campus. At these sites, cheap alcohol in large volume is provided to students, many of whom are under age. Partygoers often get their drinks free or by paying a small admission price. Heavy drinking by underage students also occurs in some bars near campus where false I.D.'s are used with little risk that they will be questioned, or where older students make the purchases. Our study, based on a large survey of colleges, put numbers on behavior that is all too obvious to members of college communities and their surrounding neighborhoods.

Some colleges, like many problem drinkers, are in denial. They may recognize that they have a problem, but it has been there for so long they have adapted to it. They are lulled into complacency as long as the problem does not get out of hand -- public brawling, for example -- or a tragedy does not occur.

Some colleges and universities are genuinely trying to do something about the problem. However, they cannot do it alone. When they have the will, and we hope to see more of this, they can provide educational programs to change student attitudes; they can provide alternative activities for students; they can limit alcohol on campus and enforce the regulations to the point of threatening expulsion. Three strikes and you're out may be a useful rule for drunken antisocial behavior. However, in many cases, the heaviest drinking takes place off campus and college officials, rightly or wrongly, feel that this is out of their control.

They need the help of public officials like yourselves in controlling drinking among their students, most of whom are underage. Those organizations and businesses who flagrantly provide alcohol to minors, and those students who disrupt the lives of others cannot be allowed to think that their actions will go unpunished. The threat of police intervention could change such thinking in a hurry. It has already helped in dealing with drunk driving. I ask you to help those colleges that are sincere in their efforts to reduce binge drinking. And I ask you to put pressure by whatever means you have on those colleges that are still in denial, insisting that they recognize their problem and act on it.