Europeans are the biggest drinkers in the world, according to today’s announcement from its European subsidiary World Health Organization (WHO).
Level… record
“The European region continues to hold the unenviable record for the highest levels of alcohol consumption and associated harm globally,” said Dr Goden Galea, WHO official for Europe, quoted in the announcement, based on the latest available data from 2019.
In EU countries “there have been no significant changes in alcohol consumption levels for more than ten years”, notes the WHO.
Residents of the Americas come in second, according to the latest WHO report published in June on global alcohol consumption, with an average of 7.5 liters per year.
Men are the biggest… drinkers
In detail, men are the ones who consume the most alcohol in Europe:
14.9 liters per year on average or four times more than women (four liters per year).
One in ten adults (11%) in Europe suffers from an alcohol-related disorder and almost one in 20 is alcohol dependent (5.9%), highlights the WHO European Annex which brings together 53 countries in Europe and Central Asia.
“In Europe, alcohol is the leading cause of death, with approximately 800,000 deaths per year,” notes the WHO.
This causes many non-communicable diseases, such as cardiovascular disease, cancer, diabetes and chronic respiratory diseases.
These diseases “are responsible for 90% of all deaths in the region (as defined by WHO) and for 85% of the years these patients live with disability,” according to WHO.
The Organization calls on European countries to “increase taxes on alcoholic beverages, implement global restrictions on alcohol trade and reduce its availability”.
The alcohol kills 2.6 million people every year worldwide, a number that remains “unacceptably high” for WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom GhebreyesusS.
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