This report from the Foundation for Alcohol Research and Education.finds that the number of Australians aged between 14 and 17 who are binge drinking has decreased by half over the last 13 years, while the number of abstainers has more than doubled. There has also been an increase in the age at which many young people first drink alcohol.
However at the other end of the scale, even though Australia’s overall level of drinking has declined, the top ten per cent of drinkers are now responsible for an increasing proportion of the total consumption (from 48.9 per cent in 2001 up to 53.2 per cent in 2013). There is a definite need to ensure that policy and prevention focuses on older adults as well as young people, since Australians over the age of 40 have shown signs of increasingly problematic drinking between 2001 and 2013.
Livingston, M. (2015). Understanding recent trends in Australian alcohol consumption. Canberra:
Foundation for Alcohol Research and Education.
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