International comparisons of alcohol consumption

Alcohol Research & Health, Wntr, 2003 by Kim Bloomfield, Tim Stockwell, Gerhard Gmel, Nina Rehn

* A recent EU project, funded partially by the European Commission, conducted a survey of alcohol use, alcohol-related problems, and attitudes toward alcohol in six European countries (Leifman 2002). Surprisingly, among these countries, abstinence in the last 12 months was lowest in Finland. Equally surprising, the highest rate of abstinence was found in France.

Overall, these studies indicate that in recent years the Mediterranean countries had comparatively higher rates of abstention than countries of central Europe. Furthermore, the abstinence rates in Scandinavian countries appear to be declining. Finally, Denmark appears as a special case in both Scandinavian and EU-wide comparisons as a country with low abstinence rates. These findings agree with the recently observed trend toward a homogenization of European drinking styles.

Current Drinking. Two studies have looked at current drinking rather than abstinence in measuring the respondent's drinking status. One study compared drinking patterns between Germany and the United States. This analysis found that within a comparable age range and with fairly similar instruments, Germany had one-third more current drinkers (i.e., people who had consumed alcohol in the past 12 months) than did the United States (Bloomfield et al. 2002). The other study was part of an EU concerted action that examined women's alcohol consumption and alcohol problems (as well as gender differences in drinking patterns) in nine European countries through a secondary analysis of survey data. In one of its analyses of basic drinking measures, Ahlstrom and colleagues (2001) found that current drinking rates (i.e., consumption in the last 12 months) were highest among French men and Swedish women and were lowest among Italian men and women. These findings for current drinking (which is the inverse of abstinence) appear to fit the conclusions drawn regarding abstinence rates as described in the preceding section.

Frequency of Drinking. Another aspect of drinking behavior often measured in comparative studies is the frequency of drinking. Several studies have assessed this variable in international comparisons. These analyses, which included information from current drinkers only, had the following results:

* The study by Hupkens and colleagues (1993) involving 12 EU member states found that Spain had the highest frequency of drinking for men, Italy had the highest frequency for women, and Ireland had the lowest frequency for both genders (in general frequency categories (2) ).

* Ahlstrom and colleagues (2001) determined that among nine European countries, France had the highest and Finland had the lowest frequency of drinking (i.e., number of drinking occasions within a month).

* Wilsnack and colleagues (2000), with their sample of 10 countries, found the highest frequencies of drinking (i.e., number of drinking occasions in a month) among Dutch women and Czech men and the lowest frequencies among Estonian women and men.

Two studies examined the rates of daily drinking in various countries. Leifman (2002) reported that when all respondents (i.e., drinkers and nondrinkers) were included in the analysis, Italy had the highest and Finland the lowest rates of daily drinking. Simpura and Karlsson (2001) examined seven countries regarding daily drinking; this analysis noted that wine countries had the highest rates, followed by beer-drinking countries and former spirits-consuming countries. This order was true for both men and women. Finally, in the two-country comparison of Bloomfield and colleagues (2002), respondents (i.e., drinkers and nondrinkers) in Germany reported almost twice as many drinking days as did U.S. respondents. All of these studies suggest that the main wine-consuming (and wine-producing) countries of Europe have the highest frequencies of drinking.