Ireland has the highest rate of binge drinkers in the EU, with nearly 20 per cent of adults reporting in a survey that they drink five or more alcoholic beverages in a single sitting.
A total of 19 per cent of people in Ireland said they had five or more drinks on average in a single sitting, according to a Eurobarometer survey published by the European Commission.
This figure, which is more than three times the EU average of 6 per cent, compares to binge-drinking rates of just 1 per cent in Bulgaria, 2 per cent in Greece and 3 per cent in Portugal.
Binge drinking is defined in the Eurobarometer survey as having five or more alcoholic drinks in one day.
EC director in Ireland Martin Territt said it was accepted that drinking cultures differ across Ireland. “Worryingly the Eurobarometer shows that in Ireland people are still binge drinking and are not responding to the fact that alcohol is the third biggest cause of premature death in the EU,” he said.
Some 27 per cent of Irish people surveyed said they consumer alcohol two or three times a week, while 7 per cent of respondents said they drink more than four times a week.
On the question of abstention, 24 per cent of Irish respondents answered that they had not had an alcoholic drink in the last 12 months. This abstention rate is ahead of countries like the UK (19 per cent), the Czech Republic (18 per cent) and Denmark (7 per cent).
According to the survey, 25 per cent of European respondents aged 55 and over reported drinking alcohol on a daily basis, compared to 3 per cent of 15-24 year olds. However, one quarter of young people aged 15-24 years drink five or more drinks once a week compared to just one in 10 people aged 55 and over.
More than half of people aged 25 and over said they would not drink less alcohol if the price increased by 25 per cent.
The survey of 1,008 people in Ireland was conducted by TNS/MRBI in October 2009.