Consideration of trends is complicated by the introduction of weighting in 2000. This increased the proportion of men drinking more than 21 units a week in 1998 by about one percentage point. The comparison of weighted and unweighted figures for 2000 and 2001, although not shown in the tables, is similar.

Over the period covered by the GHS, there has been a slight increase in overall weekly alcohol consumption among men, and a much more marked one among women, but in 2001, there was indication of a slight decline. The proportion of men drinking more than 21 units a week on average fell from 29% to 27% and there was a similar fall in the proportion of women drinking more than 14 units a week, from 17% in 2000 to 15% in 2001. There was no significant change in the proportion of men drinking on average more than 50 units a week, nor in the proportion of women drinking more than 35 units.

These changes are partially reflected in estimates of the average weekly alcohol consumption, which have been available since 1992, although the differences between the figures for 2000 and 2001 were not statistically significant .

• In 2001, men drank an average of 16.8 units a week (equivalent to almost 8.5 pints of beer), compared with 17.4 units in 2000. Women drank an average of 7.4 units a week, less than half as much as men, but this compared with 7.1 units in 2000.

The average consumption among young women aged 16 to 24 continues to rise: it increased from 12.6 units in 2000 to 14.0 units in 2001 - it has almost doubled in the ten years since 1992.

Among both men and women, alcohol consumption was highest among those aged 16 to 24, and then declined with increasing age. Overall, in 2001, men’s consumption was more than twice that of women but the difference was less marked among younger than among older people. This again reflects the trend that has occurred in recent years for women’s consumption to increase relative to that of men, particularly among younger age groups.