The 22% rate relates to 2021, and is down slightly compared to the 2017-2020 period.
Public Health France (SpF) reveals today that more than one French adult in five (22%) exceeds the ceilings of alcohol consumption.
In its latest epidemiological bulletin, the health agency specifies:
Between 2020 and 2021, in mainland France, the proportion of adults declaring alcohol consumption above the lower-risk consumption benchmarks decreased significantly, from 23.7% to 22.0%.
Alcohol: an “encouraging” decrease
But what limits are we talking about? Since 2017, information campaigns have relayed recommendations for lower-risk drinking: a maximum of 10 drinks per week, a maximum of two drinks per day, and days in the week without drinking.
Public Health France judges the drop in the proportion of adults exceeding these benchmarks “encouraging”because it had not declined during the last period (2017-2020).
The reason for this drop?
Satisfaction is all the greater as “the context of the health and social crisis linked to Covid-19 continued in 2021” And “could have predicted an upward trend in alcohol consumption”notes the public health agency.
SpF believes that the health crisis “could have reduced festive occasions” of the youngest and encouraged the oldest to “limit convivial moments conducive to consumption to prevent possible contamination with Covid-19”.
Sixty alcohol-related diseases
It is estimated that France has 42.8 million alcohol consumers. And Public Health France ensures that“It remains necessary to continue to inform about the risks of alcohol consumption, even at low doses”.
More or less directly, alcohol is linked to more than sixty pathologies, whether cardiovascular, digestive or mental illnesses, to name only these major categories. It is the number one cause of hospitalization and the second cause of preventable death in our country.
Regional disparities
“However, benchmarks are exceeded significantly compared to the metropolitan average in Brittany, Pays-de-la-Loire and Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes”, observes the health agency. On the other hand, “it is lower in Île-de-France, Bourgogne-Franche-Comté and in all the DROMs”.
And Inserm notes for its part, and again in this bulletin, that “Individual satisfaction and the financial profits generated by alcohol consumption do not manage to exceed the cost of pathologies and mortality: 49,000 deaths per year for a social cost estimated at 118 billion euros”.