

“We've had anecdotal information about people buying and consuming more alcohol, but this is some of the first survey-based information that shows how much alcohol consumption has increased during the pandemic,” said Michael Pollard, lead author of the study and a sociologist at RAND, a nonprofit research organization. The results are published as a research letter in the journal JAMA Network Open. The increase was 19% among all adults aged 30 to 59, 17% among women, and 10% among for non-Hispanic white adults. The trends here likely are no cause of alarm, and more research needs to be done to concretely define the effects of a high per capita alcohol consumption on a country.American adults have sharply increased their consumption of alcohol during the shutdown triggered by the coronavirus pandemic, with women increasing their heavy drinking episodes (four or more drinks within a couple of hours) by 41%, according to a new RAND Corporation study.Ī national survey found that the overall frequency of alcohol consumption increased by 14% among adults over age 30, compared to the same time last year. Alcohol’s effects can be detrimental or benign, depending on how responsibly it is consumed. In conclusion, we know that alcohol plays an important role in many societies, just as other beverages like soft drinks, juices, tea, cocoa, and coffee. Final Thoughts On National Drinking Patterns Populations in these regions may tend to consume a lot of alcohol in order to negate the effects of cold weather, as alcohol can create an illusion of ‘warming’ the body. Many of the countries listed lie within some of the coldest regions on earth. Another factor might be attributed to weather conditions. For example, Russian vodka is a traditional drink within the country, and given the high alcohol content of this drink this fact might attribute to Russia being high up on the table. European countries might exhibit such a trend because major producers of the biggest alcoholic brands originate from there, which can itself be attributed to the fact that drinking has been a cultural institution for these countries for many centuries, and the activity has been passed down through successive generations. There are several factors that could have led to such tendencies within and between certain groups of countries. That is why we use per capita consumption of pure alcohol as a measurement to avoid being biased as much as possible. We need to note here that we are not discussing rates of alcoholism, which is an addiction to the consumption of alcohol, but rather the average consumption of alcohol within a country. Meanwhile, countries in Asia, Africa, and the pacific have much lower rates of consumption. The highest rates can be seen in countries like Belarus, Lithuania, the Czech Republic, Ireland, and France. Looking at the published statistics, the highest consumption rates of alcohol seem to be concentrated in Europe and other places in the Northern Hemisphere of the globe. This data represents alcohol consumption per capita for people who are over 15 years of age per population. Luckily, we have access to data that has been collected and documented by the World Health Organization just for such purposes. "Pure alcohol" is an important constraint, as some forms of alcoholic beverages are very intoxicating, while others have much less actual alcohol within them. To avoid confusion and misjudgment as much as possible, the best way to measure alcohol consumption anywhere in the world is through the per capita consumption of pure alcohol within a given country. There has also been an argument as to which countries consume the most alcohol. Every topic from where the most expensive beer is sold in the world to where it is cheapest is fair game. There seem to be discussions all around the world in regards to spirit-filled beverages, from their creation to their consumption patterns.
