Alcohol consumption during the COVID-19 pandemic in Europe: a large-scale cross-sectional study in 21 countries (preprint)
Abstract
Aims: The aim of this project was to investigate changes in alcohol consumption during the first months of the pandemic in Europe as well as its associations with income and experiences of distress related to the COVID-19 pandemic. Design: Cross-sectional online survey conducted between April 24 and July 22 of 2020. Setting: 21 European countries. Participants: 31,964 adults reporting past-year drinking. Measurements: Changes in alcohol consumption were measured by asking respondents about changes during the previous month in their drinking frequency, the quantity they consumed, and incidence of heavy episodic drinking events. Individual indicators were combined into an aggregated consumption-change score and scaled to a possible range: -1 to +1. Using this score as outcome, multilevel linear regressions tested changes in overall drinking, taking into account sampling weights and baseline alcohol consumption (AUDIT-C) and country of residence serving as random intercept. Similar models were conducted for each single consumption-change indicator. Findings: In almost all countries, the consumption-change score indicated alcohol use to decrease on average; except in Ireland and the UK, where alcohol consumption on average remained unchanged or increased, respectively. Decreases in drinking were mostly driven by a reduced frequency of heavy episodic drinking. Declines in consumption were less marked among those with low- or average incomes, and those experiencing distress.…
How strong is the evidence?
Evidence Hub reads this as a cross-sectional, done in people. Its evidence level is 4 of 5 (Low · observational). Observational designs can show an association but not prove cause. Reported size: 31,964 participants or records.
Read the paper
Related studies
- Challenges and opportunities with drug repurposing: finding strategies to find alternative uses of therapeutics
- Challenges in Chagas Disease Drug Development
- T Cell Specificity: A Great Challenge in Chagas Disease
- Benznidazole treatment leads to DNA damage in Trypanosoma cruzi and the persistence of rare widely dispersed non-replicative amastigotes in mice
- Rapid Molecular Detection of Terbinafine-resistant Dermatophytes
- Identifying novel drugs with new modes of action for neglected tropical fungal skin diseases (fungal skinNTDs) using an Open Source Drug discovery approach
Go deeper in Evidence Hub
Evidence Hub adds a study data sheet (design, sample size, evidence level, key numbers), an AI summary and a chat grounded in the paper's text.