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Fitness & Health

13th Mar 2019

Irish teenage girls amongst the world’s worst for binge drinking

Paul Moore

binge drinking

Greater than 55%.

Recent research on the topic of adolescent health and wellbeing has shown that teenage girls in Ireland are amongst the world’s worst for binge drinking.

Binge drinking is defined as drinking six or more standard drinks in one sitting. Common examples of one standard drink are a half pint of lager/stout/cider, a 100ml glass of wine or pub measure (35.5ml) of spirits.

The research was conducted by the Lancet Commission and tracked 12 headline indicators for 195 countries and territories from the period of 1990–2016.

With regards to the issue of binge drinking, in 2016, 71 million adolescents aged 15–19 years were binge drinking during that particular year – 44 million males and 27 million females.

The research showed that the prevalence of binge drinking among females aged 15–19 were at their highest in Ireland, Denmark, New Zealand, and Finland. The figure for these four countries was greater than 55%.

For males, binge drinking was at its highest – over 60% – in Austria, Denmark, and Finland.

The research covers a multitude of other health issues but in terms of the other notable findings for Irish people, Ireland also has one of lowest prevalences of anaemia in the world – less than 4%.

Topics:

Drinking,Health