Drinkers in the UK consume the equivalent of a bottle of wine per week more than they admit, research released today shows.
Analysis from the Centre for Public Health, published by
Alcohol Concern, shows that drink surveys used to measure the public’s
alcohol consumption grossly underestimate how much people really drink.
The difference between survey data and actual sales data reveals that
225 million litres of alcohol per year go unaccounted for. This is
equivalent to 430 million units of alcohol per week, or 44 million
bottles of wine.
Current high levels of alcohol consumption mean there
would need to be a reduction of around 184 million litres of alcohol per
year in sales (nearly a 1/3 of all current sales based on 2007/08 data)
just for the average consumption of female and male drinkers to fall to
14 units and 21 units per week respectively, the report says.
Calculations of alcohol-related deaths and illnesses,
messages about responsible drinking and analyses of the effectiveness of
prevention methods all rely on survey data to give an accurate
portrayal of the nation’s drinking habits. The report claims that
current alcohol surveys are ill-equipped to accurately measure levels of
consumption, meaning the future burden of alcohol harm on public
services could be much greater than previously thought.
Professor Mark Bellis, Director of the Centre for Public Health and lead author of the work said:
“It is easy to see how so much alcohol can be consumed without actually registering in surveys.
“When asked to think about their drinking, people often
ignore occasional heavier drinking sessions, holidays, weddings and
other celebrations like Christmas parties. Even when people try to
remember such occasions, generally the more they have drunk, the more
they are likely to forget. As a result, the difference between what
people say they drink and sales data on how much is actually bought for
consumption is huge.
Elsewhere more sophisticated tools have been developed to
better measure levels of consumption. As individuals and as a nation we
urgently need to have more accurate measures of how much alcohol we
consume and a better understanding of the harms caused by such
consumption.
Alcohol Concern Chief Executive Don Shenker said:
“If we underestimate our drinking levels, then we’re
underestimating the amount of harm we can expect to happen to our
families, communities and wider society – as well as how much further we
need to go to curb our excessive consumption.
“Poor survey intelligence can result in misinformed
policy. Any future government must get to grips with measuring the true
scale and nature of this problem if it is to make a difference to reduce
alcohol harms.”
Download the full report here. (pdf 668kb)