Drinking among Ireland’s younger population has been increasing over the last decade, despite a drop in the mid-2000s, a new report suggests.
On Thursday, Alcohol Action Ireland (AAI) published a new report on consumption drawing on data from national and international sources.
While it found “considerable improvements” in some respects, including an increase in the average age at which young people start drinking, it also highlights a negative trend among those aged 15 to 24.
Drinking in that cohort declined from the mid-2000s to the mid-2010s, the report said, but since 2015 the trend has reversed, with consumption rising from 66 per cent of the cohort in 2018 to 75 per cent in 2024.
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“What is also clear is that when drinking is initiated it is accompanied by high levels of particularly risky and hazardous consumption – 64 per cent regularly binge drink and one in three young drinkers has an alcohol use disorder,” the report claims.
It also found that in 2019, young people were an average of 16.6 years old when they had their first drink, older than the 15.6 years recorded in 2002.
“However, while young people are delaying alcohol initiation, once they begin drinking they consume alcohol at a level above the national average,” it added.
Dr Sheila Gilheany, AAI chief executive, said in recent years a “narrative has emerged that youth drinking is perhaps no longer an issue in Ireland”.
“However, a close analysis of the facts indicates that alcohol remains Ireland’s largest drug problem both for young people and the wider population, with significant health impacts such as rising levels of alcohol-related hospitalisations among young people and, tragically, half of young driver fatalities having an alcohol component,” she said.
“It is the norm in Ireland for underage drinking, with 50,000 children starting to drink annually with consequent impact on their current and future health. This is not surprising given the saturation levels of alcohol marketing to which they are exposed, particularly online. Fundamentally, this is a breach of children’s rights under the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child.”
Prof Bobby Smyth, a clinical professor at the department of public health and primary care at Trinity College Dublin TCD, as well as a board member of AAI, said the pattern of drinking among young people was “high risk”.
“There is still a hard core of parents who insist that providing alcohol to their 15- and 16-year-old children is a good idea in spite of the evidence that it is in fact harmful, but the number of parents who recognise the folly of this permissive approach is growing,” he said.
“The unrelenting exposure of children to alcohol advertising and sponsorship does, though, mean that parents who do the right thing are swimming against a tide of more negative influence.”
Separately, the Institute for Public Health (IPH) held a conference on Thursday morning around the impact of alcohol, drugs and diet on the health of the nation.
Prof Roger O’Sullivan, director of ageing research and development at the IPH, said lives are “shaped on a daily basis by commercial factors or practices, such as the aggressive marketing and promotion of unhealthy products”.
“As we live in an increasingly digital world, we are also faced with a rise in misinformation and disinformation on online platforms.”
