We’re top of drinking league - What’s the real cause of this?

WE have as many well-intentioned measures to curtail drinking as there are artisan craft beers, but one report after another shows how determined we are to indulge. 

We will not be dissuaded.

The latest one shows that Irish people between the ages of 18 and 35 top a table of 25 countries for drinking at home before going out for a night’s entertainment.

A Drug and Alcohol Review table on heavy drinking puts Ireland in fourth place.

These are not cheering findings and probably point to issues far beyond alcohol.

More that eight out of 10 Irish drinkers in that age group admitted to drinking at home before going out — “pre-loading”.

This habit is, unsurprisingly, linked with dysfunctional drinking and the consequences of that behaviour.

The findings, published by the Health Research Board, pointed to cultural issues: Our national enthusiasm for drink, our proclivity to drink heavily, and the gap between the cost of home drinking and drinking in a club or a bar.

This suggests that, unless we can resolve, or at least realign, the first of two of those three factors, our drinking culture will not change very much.

Neither will the toll it exacts on far too many people in this society.

It is too easy to be sanctimonious about drink, to lecture from the high moral ground but these figures, once again, describe habits that may have little enough to do with alcohol but may be rooted in something far deeper. Any ideas?