Rachael Davis
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It’s no secret that Brits love boozing. We’re renowned for it; from the humble village pub to the dreaded Brit Abroad, or from the Student Union to Sun, Sex and Suspicious Parents, we’re no strangers to getting blotto.
Of course, it’s not big and it’s not clever, but the point here is that you wouldn’t be surprised to find us amongst the world’s booziest nations.
A few other names might come to mind, such as the Aussies, Irish, Germans, and Russians, but are the stereotypes playing out in reality?
As far as the top three is concerned, the UK has made the cut, but the other two on the podium might surprise you.
Again, it’s nothing to be proud of. Our love for a drink causes no end of social problems, from violence and vandalism to short and long-term health consequences that put strain on individuals, families, communities, and our healthcare services.
The NHS recommends drinking no more than 14 units of alcohol per week, spread over three days or more, but it’s a boundary that’s often crossed on a ‘quiet one’ at the local.
As a general rule, we could all do with taking a step back now and then to ensure our drinking is within ‘moderate’ bounds.
So, who are the other two Bacchanalian nations who don’t know when to call last orders?
The data comes courtesy of the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD), with its health rankings covering 33 countries. Across those countries, the average proportion of heavy drinkers was a whopping 19%.
That figure has some pretty big upper and lower bounds, though, with just 3% of people in Turkey saying they were binge drinking at least once per month, while in the UK the figure rises to 35%.
Top of the list was: Denmark.
It turns out the Danes are even more debauched than we are, with 37% saying they drank heavily at least once per month.
Coming in second was Romania, which has perhaps unfairly flown under most of our radars in the Booze Olympics.
We can’t stress this enough: being in the top three is no badge of honour.
“Alcohol causes too much harm here in the UK,” Dr Richard Piper, chief executive of Alcohol Change UK, told PA News Agency. “But this is totally avoidable.
“There is an overwhelming need for the Government to introduce measures that we know will reduce alcohol harm and save lives such as proper controls on alcohol marketing, introducing minimum unit pricing in England like we already have in Scotland and Wales, and clearer alcohol labelling.”
Elsewhere in the data, we find that the UK is doing better than many nations in terms of smoking. Our smoking rates are lower than the average among surveyed countries, but we’re above-average for vaping with 1 in 20 of us admitting to that particular vice.
Fingers crossed the incoming ban on disposable vapes brings that figure down.