Among Australians who drink alcohol, the usual quantity consumed per day differs by age. Australians aged 18-24 years generally consume more standard drinks on a day they drink than any other age group.
Who binge drinks? Binge drinking is most common among younger adults aged 18–34. Binge drinking is more common among men than among women. Binge drinking is most common among adults who have higher household incomes ($75,000 or more), are non-Hispanic White, or live in the Midwest.
While WA residents are most likely to have drunk alcohol in the last week, Queenslanders are consuming the highest average number of drinks per week overall.
Australian men usually drink more than women on a day they have alcohol. Women are more likely than men to drink two or less standard drinks per occasion (63% vs 43%).
In 2019, the average age at which Australians aged 14 years and older consumed their first serve of alcohol was 17 years. However, the average age at which 14-24 year olds consumed their first serve of alcohol was 16 years.
The percentage of Australians who drink alcohol on a daily basis decreased significantly from 6% in 2016 to 5.4% in 2019. In South Australia in 2019, 5.8% reported drinking alcohol daily; men were 3.5 times more likely to drink daily than South Australian women.
The proportion of the population aged 14 and over who consumed alcohol daily declined significantly between 2016 (6.0%) and 2019 (5.4%) (AIHW 2020, Table 3.1). 1 in 3 adults (33%) who drink alcohol drink at levels that exceed the Australian Alcohol Guidelines and put them at risk of alcohol-related disease or injury.
Among the nation's largest racial and ethnic groups, White adults aged 18 and older (68%) are more likely than Hispanic adults (59%) or Black adults (50%) to report they drink.
Adult Men Drink More than Women
Almost 58% of adult men report drinking alcohol in the past 30 days compared with 49% of adult women. Men are more likely to binge drink than women.
Gnowangerup has been crowned the booziest town in Australia, with one-third of its adult residents necking two or more alcoholic drinks every day.
Each month 20.4% of Australians consume alcohol at high risk levels. Australians living in remote areas are more likely to drink at high risk levels compared to those living in urban areas. The driving forces behind Australia's drinking culture are derived from social customs, habits, publicised images and normality.
Belarus, a country that drinks the most liters of pure alcohol than any other country in the world, was also classified as having one the riskiest pattern of drinking.
Gallup found that people ages 35-54 are the most likely generation to drink alcohol (70%), compared to Gen Z (60%) and baby boomers (52%).
Alcohol is an intrinsic part of Australian culture and it plays a central role in most people's social lives. Heavy drinking is seen as acceptable in almost all social situations, from weddings to sports matches, and even at funerals or baby showers.
The mean age at onset of alcohol use and alcohol use disorder declined from 24 to 17 years and 46 to 21 years, respectively, from the pre-1950 birth cohort to the post-1985 birth cohort.
Which country drinks the most in Europe? In 2019, the top 10 European countries with the highest alcohol consumption per capita were Czechia (14.3 litres), Latvia (13.2), Moldova (12.9), Germany (12.8), Lithuania (12.8), Ireland (12.7), Spain (12.7), Bulgaria (12.5), Luxembourg (12.4), and Romania (12.3).
According to the 2021 National Survey on Drug Use and Health (NSDUH), 29.5 million people ages 12 and older (10.6% in this age group) had AUD in the past year. This includes: 16.6 million males ages 12 and older (12.1% in this age group) 13.0 million females ages 12 and older (9.1% in this age group)
Age. Young people are the most at-risk for drunk driving. NHTSA data shows that drivers between the ages of 21-24 account for 27% of all fatal alcohol-impaired crashes, followed closely by 25-34 year olds (25%).
Millennial Alcoholism. The National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism states that young adults make up 31% of all alcoholics. Just like how parents and older generations drink at home after a long day, so do millennials.
Adolescents and young adults are the heaviest consumers of sugary drinks. Even young infants and toddlers drink a lot of sugary drinks, primarily fruit drinks.
Approximately 40% of the population (aged 14 years and over) drink alcohol at least once per week, including 5% of the population who drink daily. Twenty-three percent of Australians do not drink alcohol at all.
An estimated 15 million people struggle with an alcohol use disorder in the United States, but less than 10% of them receive treatment. More than 65 million Americans report binge drinking in the past month, which is more than 40% of the total of current alcohol users. Teen alcohol use kills 4,700 people each year.