Alcohol Trends

Alcohol trends from the 2009 National Survey on Drug Use and Health (NSDUH) shows:

• Over fifty percent of people in the U.S. over the age of twelve have said that they are current consumers of alcohol (in 2009). This equals over 130M persons; just higher than the numbers from 2008.
• Almost twenty-five percent of people over the age of twelve said they had at least one episode of binge consumption, totaling about sixty million persons nationwide. This estimate from 2009 was about the same as the numbers from 2008.
• Alcohol trends for 2009 show that over six percent of people in the U.S. over the age of twelve considered their drinking to be heavy (about seventeen million people); which is similar to the rate from 2008.
• In 2009, for people between the ages of eighteen and twenty-five binge drinking numbers were over forty percent and the percentage of heavy drinkers was just over thirteen percent, which is similar to the 2008 numbers. For young people between the ages of twelve and seventeen the percentages who are currently consuming alcohol is just over fourteen percent; the same rate as 2008. For youths, binge consumption was at just over eight percent and heavy consumption was just about two percent.
• Alcohol trends for people between the ages of twelve and twenty: last 30 days alcohol consumption rates were just over sixteen percent for Asians, twenty percent for African Americans, twenty-two percent for American Indians, just over twenty-five percent for Hispanics, and over thirty percent for caucasians.
• Over fifty-five percent of people between the ages of twelve and twenty who consider themselves current drinkers said that the last time they had a drink in the last thirty days was at a friend's house, and just under thirty percent said they had that drink at home. About 30% said they purchased their drink the last time; nine percent paid for it themselves and over twenty percent had someone else purchase it (in 2009).
• The 2009 alcohol trends revealed that approximately twelve percent of people over the age of twelve got behind the wheel of an automobile after consuming alcohol.

Questions in The National Survey on Drug Use and Health (NSDUH) on alcohol trends include ones pertaining to the most recent consumption of liquor as well as how frequently an individual consumes alcohol. A comprehensive checklist of the types of alcoholic drinks included is provided to survey takers before they are administered the questions. Drink definitions are as follows: One drink is denoted as a container of beer, a serving of wine, a serving of liquor, or any liquid containing alcohol. If the survey taker had only a small amount of an alcoholic beverage it is not considered to be a drink. In this survey, three levels of drinking alcohol are reported for both genders and all age groups are as below:

• Latest Consumption - Refers to having a drink with last 30 days.
• Binge drinking - 5 or more beverages in close proximity of each other all done in one day over the past month.
• Heavy drinking - 5 or more beverages in close proximity of each other - repeated behavior on at least 5 days over the past month.

Individuals who use alcohol don't necessarily fit into just one of the above drinking levels. Heavy drinking could include in part some reports of binge drinking and latest consumption.

Alcohol Trends and Consumption for People Twelve Years and Older

• More than 50% of people in the U.S. who are twelve years and older have described themselves as regularly and recently consuming alcohol in the 2009 survey (51.9%). This equals approximately 130.6M persons, which is up from the 2008 estimates.
• Almost 25% of people over and including the age of twelve say that they found themselves binge drinking within the last thirty days equaling approximately nearly 60 million persons. This number is similar to the 2008 survey numbers.
• Almost 7% (nearly 17 million people) of people (age twelve and older) in the U.S. reported heavy alcohol consumption in 2009. This estimate is close to the 2008 estimates of heavy alcohol consumption.

Alcohol Trends based on Age

• For people between the ages of twelve and thirteen, the rate of current alcohol consumption was between three and four percent, in 2009; the percentage jumped to just about thirteen percent of people between fouteen and fifteen. And the precentage of current alcohol drinkers rose again to over twenty-six percent for youths between sixteen and seventeen years of age. For youths between the ages of eighteen and twenty, the percentage was just under fifty of those who currently consume alcohol. And finally, a whopping seventy percent of people ages twenty-one to twenty-five currently consume alcoholic beverages. The 2008 reported estimates are very much like the 2009 estimates.
• For older people, current alcohol consumption lessened as age increased, from over 65% for ages twenty-six to twenty-nine to just about 50% for age group sixty to sixty-four and only about thirty-nine percent for people over sixty-five years old and older.
• Binge alcohol consumption numbers in 2009 were just under 2% for youths twelve to thirteen years old, just about seven percent for teens between fouteen and fifteen years of age, seventeen percent for sixteen or seventeen year old teenagers, a higer percentage (almost 35%) for people between eighteen and twenty years old, and over 45% for people between twenty-one and twenty-five years old.
• For youths between the ages of eighteen and twenty-five, those participating in binge drinking was over 40%. For that same age group, heavy consumption was reported to be around thirteen percent. These numbers are similar to the 2008 numbers.
• The percentage of people over the age of sixty-five who considered themselves binge drinkers was just under ten percent as opposed to those who considered themselves heavy drinkers (just about two percent).
• Youths between the ages of twelve and seventeen that reported to have had a drink in the last thirty days was about fouteen percent in 2009. Binge consumption and heavy consumption among young people were just under nine percent (binge) and just over two percent (heavy). These numbers are similar to the numbers reported from 2008.

Alcohol Trends based on Gender

• Nearly sixty percent of males over the age of twelve were regular consumers of alcohol which is a higher percentage than their female counterparts (females are just over forty-six percent). Conversely, for younger age groups current drinking rates for both males and females are about the same at between fouteen and fifteen percent.
• Among young people between the ages of eighteen and twenty-five it is reported that over fifty percent of females and over sixty-five percent of males are current drinkers of alcohol.